E-Waste

Last August, the legislation that changed the world of electronic waste (E-waste) came into force; the products that fall into this category became many more.

The list now also includes: Cedit cards with chips, Electric bicycles, Automated gates and curtains, Electric locks, Cables and Pellet stoves.

It’s a real revolution.

«The collection and recycling of WEEE (waste electrical and electronic equipment) will increase. In Italy, 78% of this waste is of domestic origin, while 22% comes from the business world. There is talk of over 1 million tons of E-Waste produced per year in our country. Not all recycling companies can manage electronic waste. Up to 70-80% of electronic waste described as “recycled” is sent to developing countries such as Ghana, India and China. The European law on electronic waste establishes that all citizens can dispose of their electronic waste free of charge, which can be taken to specific collection points, at the distributor or retailer of electronics from which you buy a new equivalent product, at department stores , that are obliged to take charge of small appliances without any obligation on your part to buy a new product. In many countries, batteries, phones and bulbs can be disposed of in collectors located in supermarkets and in a good number of smaller stores.

So, as you have seen, it is not difficult to dispose of this type of waste, moreover, if you are not sure of something, you can consult numerous websites that report all the indispensable for the case suitable for you.

The electronic waste problem is huge: over 48 million tons go electronic-waste are produced every year.

E-Waste is a global problem, is shipped overseas, where it’s burned for scrap by kids in Junkyards but they don’t know how toxic their job really is.

Even so, encouraging a global market for used electronics does more good than harm:

-repaired electronics give people access to low-cost electronics and help them to access the awesome benefits of technology;

-used electronics create repair jobs in developing countries that often have few opportunities for skilled labour;

-reuse in developing countries is usually more effective than domestic recycling – there’s not much of a market for old cathode ray tubes monitors in the USA for example, but they are used in other countries.

We create too much e-waste and it’s time to fix this problem so we need more e-waste repair; we need to take a page from the book of experts and repairs in developing countries.

We have to stop throwing away computers that could be fixed with a low cost.

But the bad repair manuals stops us. The hardest part it’s to figure out the problem, the more likely someone is to give up and decide to replace the machine instead.

Electronic waste, also known as “e-waste”, happens when electronic products become obsolete because advancements in technology changes in fashion, style or status at the end of their useful life.
E-waste includes a lot of devices, from computers to calculators and covers recording devices like dvds and cds.
E-waste is a rapidly growing environmental problem; for this there are some behaviors that should be used to prevent the increase of it, like learning how to repair devices, buy less, or sell/donate the products. You can also look for items that can be reused so there isn’t the need of replacing it, or you can rent or borrow things that are used infrequently, like decorations or tools, so that you can make those items last longer.

It has been estimated that 20 to 50 million metric tons of e-waste are generated yearly worldwide; especially in Agbogbloshie, in Ghana, west Africa, is located one of the largest e-waste market of the world, resulted from illegal dumping by developed countries.

The principal problem that causes e-waste are damage at the environment and at people’s health; health risks may result from direct contact with harmful materials such as lead,cadmium(now banned from electronic devices), chromium and other materials that menace the health even by getting inhaled. Furthermore, dismantling these devices may bear an increased risk of injury.

During the last few years, various international calls for actions have highlighted the need of intervention in the field of e-waste. These include the libreville declaration emanating from the first interministerial conference on health and environment in Africa (2008), the busan pledge for action on children environmental health of 2009 and the strategic approach to integrated chemical management’s  expanded global plan of action issued at the international conference on chemical management iccm3 in 2012.