The dark side of electronic waste recycling

Electronic waste is a hazardous and difficult form of garbage to manage. Though a lot of e-waste can be recycled responsibly, many e-waste processors choose instead to ship it overseas for junkyards in poorer nations to deal with. Remarkably, exporting e-waste is perfectly legal in the US...but thanks to a scrappy nonprofit watchdog, some unscrupulous exporters are still going to jail.

[mukkaar]

Shipping this stuff off is just moving the problem. If there was much more development and focus on recycling, it might even become very profitable industry.
This needs to apply at every level of industry so this idea is part of the design and manufacturing.

[tzwacdastag]

Me: Where to Find Rare Earth Elements?


Computer: Did you mean the Elements inside Me

[BalkanskiSpijun-]

2018: Your old phone is a veritable gold mine
2019: The dark side of electronic waste recycling

[lya]

Conclusion : It might be the best to not recycle electronic waste since landfill are well reglemented : they colect all the fluid, it's not exported far away, and does not cause harm to the people in china who are sorting the wastes.

[KillAtron]

This is a verry interesting topic to me. I want to get involved locally and do more for my community and it's e-waste removal.

[oOCentralSunOo]

An even deeper core problem is that there is no incentive for making items that will last long. In fact, if you can sell something that will need to be replaced you will make more money. So that's what happens. We need to restructure our system to value longevity, repairability as well as ease of recycling.

[zhendiz]

9:27 so... "...took home almost 8 million...", "...it would cost about 2.5 million to do this properly..." and "...they would've made 6.5 million..."??? like... 8 - 2.5 = 5.5? 😂

[bobyoung]

This is sad. It seems as if there are enough valuable materials in a computer - metals, for example; some plastics; wiring - that could be recycled for use here in the United States.

[husnainanwaar]

Why don't Apple or Samsung recycle ?

[ianroselio]

the no.1 solution for the plastic, rubber, etc. waste materials is grind them and turns to powder. then use them to mix with cement, sand to build roads, bldg. house, tunnels. etc. so there will no thrash in each country.

[gabrielfair]

Wow! Great job Verge and BAN. I always worried the electronics recycling wasn't what I assumed it was

[YellowCarBlueSlime]

This is just another reason to keep your old electronics. I always kept my old stuff in case i needed a spare part or wanted to give someone a new device (say someone lost there phone and can't buy a new one at that moment) and this just a better reason for me to keep on doing it.

[Elfnetdesigns]

There is not enough mercury in an LCD backlight lamp to do anything. Even still that mercury is not in vapor form because it is not energized. mercury is only dangerous in vapor form unless you intentionally ingest it in liquid form. Modern TV sets and monitors use LED backlighting and lead free solder so the danger risk is lowered however many many repair shops in the US do not use lead free solder while repairing devices because lead free solder has a high failure rate and is difficult to work with.
Also you have some recyclers that shred electronics and other recyclable materials so they can compact as much as possible into a shipment

[kenjett]

I do E-scraping as a hobby and where i am seems its hard to find E-Scrap. Wish i could get alot of that sent my way as i do break everything down and refine all the metals. Cost profit margin is small as scrap prices are so poor. If scrap prices was brought up till a profit could be made. People like me could afford to buy electronic scrap instead of trying to collect it for free. Alot of the reason for this scrap going where it shouldn't is simply isnt much profit for the recyclers. $ 40 a ton for steel doesnt pay for the fuel to haul it. The ABS plastic that incases most electronics no one wants it and no where to properly dispose of it. So for most its either going to be in a landfill here in our own country or in a landfill elsewhere. As for me i am planning on experimenting with tuning the waist plastic i collect back into oil. As part of my refining process of the precious metals. That just leaves the steel if prices ever go back up, then i can haul in my steel stock pile.

[lbrown]

Open source operating systems solve a lot of these problems

[erticyusa]

E-waste? We are happily receive those. No problem at all. E waste=free money

[diGritz]

Madness... We pay out ridiculous amounts for high end components and it all ends up in the same place. That 2080ti someone's rocking is going to end up in the same place as that Voodoo3.

[WheresTheFun]

I'm in the process of building a recycling buisness in germany. All waste gets recycled. Electronics go back to oil and steel aswell as precious metals.

[ON-YT]

This looks like a CBC marketplace investigation.

[whiteboythst]

I just keep my electronics, for some reason if my current phone breaks down I have my old on that will just be as my back up for the mean time.