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The dark side of electronic waste recycling

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Re: The dark side of electronic waste recycling

#31

Post by 8bitsrule »

hateful wrote: post #9

Can someone summarize what they did? Just when I think the article is going to tell me - it breaks into the life story of some guy from Seattle.

A well-thought-of Seattle recycling firm created a fake paper trail for toxic e-waste which covered up what they were really up to. 'Conspiracy to defraud'. They were caught by environmental activist surveillance. They got slap-on-the-wrist sentences (28 months, down from 20 years). They're still in business.

The video. (10 minutes). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vufLW4xOsS4

The BasilActionNetwork's website, where you (and corporations, governments, and institutions) can track your IT disposals. https://www.eartheye.org/

Re: The dark side of electronic waste recycling

#32

Post by throwaway1777 »

Accujack wrote: post #3
howmayiannoyyou wrote: post #2

Not defending Total Reclaim's misrepresentation BUT.... the market for many recyclable commodities is insufficient to justify processing expense in the US. Why? Two reasons. First, there's little manufacturing capacity remaining in North America to utilize many (not all) recyclable commodities. Second, subsidies and currency manipulation continue to dump virgin commodities and new products into the US. This is not a…

There's no for-profit motive to justify recycling of much, that's true. However, recycling can still work well if there's money built in to the price of items for recycling what they're made of. In other words, a surcharge built into the cost of e.g. a flatscreen monitor for recycling is held in escrow during the device's lifetime. When it's end of life, the company that recycles it can claim that charge as part of i…

There's no way this would work practically. For one thing: an escrow system?! Who's going to pay for that? Secondly no politician is going to create a bill which makes electronics far more expensive. That's not corruption, it's simply not wanting to piss off your constituents.

Re: The dark side of electronic waste recycling

#33

Post by lonelappde »

baroffoos wrote: post #30
destitude wrote: post #29

Shouldn't one of the solutions be for manufacturers to make the products easier to recycle to begin with and/or use safer materials in the construction? Even at a higher level I think it would help if we had e-products that end-users could repair easier. Apple touts how environmental they are but then make it nearly impossible to do something as simple as replace a battery in a Macbook for instance.

Its corporate green washing. Companies know that customers generally feel some amount of guilt over the products they purchase due to the environmental impact of them so they get the marketing teams to find some way to ease that guilt without actually doing much at all. Recycling has mostly been a global scale PR move to make people think they can buy as much product as they want and its ok because it gets turned in…

Producers and consumers are equal partners on pollution. If consumers don't want to buy polluting products they must stop, by self-control or by passing laws.

Re: The dark side of electronic waste recycling

#34

Post by dbtx »

PBS video buried in the article: https://www.pbs.org/video/kcts-9-documentaries-circuit/

This reminds me of one I saw quite some time ago: The Toxic E-Waste Trade Killing Pakistan's Poorest (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=axYKPbr9_MA)

IMO it would be nice to have better circumstances for more Dr. Frankensteins putting more working machines together from scrap. That means big-name equipment and semiconductor manufacturers need to be more open with their tech specs and datasheets and obsolete firmware sources and so on, especially for parts and protocols that aren't even used in "current" machines-- instead of trade secrets in black boxes being the only reason working electronic bits are no longer usable.

Then we can give more "weak" frankenputers to more poor kids and more 3rd world countries, in theory.

edit: Last year I replaced an entire SMPS & CCFL backlight driver PCB from a TV that stopped turning on. I'm not terribly good at diagnosing SMPSs but I found a chip that was getting power and not giving power, so I looked around for a replacement-- and it's not available. Its design was found to be infringing on some other semiconductor giant's patent, so places like DigiKey and Mouser were not legally allowed to sell it any longer. But hey, I can get the whole board on eBay for could have borrowed the good one from the working board, which I should not even have needed to buy, but I'd rather have it just keep working). All together, that is annoying.

Re: The dark side of electronic waste recycling

#35

Post by Scoundreller »

spencey wrote: post #20

Back in 2009 my family member was a partial owner of an electronics recycling facility in northern California. I worked in warehouse at times and I can tell you from experience that everything was incinerated or recycled. They had huge deals at the time with Apple and Lucent. Part of the deal was that all the precious metals that were recovered were given back to the companies for manufacturing. Most surprising thing…

Also, the big manufacturers do NOT want you to re-use what they made.

They'd much prefer it all get melted down and make their new equipment inputs much cheaper.

Re: The dark side of electronic waste recycling

#36

Post by leggomylibro »

dbtx wrote: post #34

PBS video buried in the article: https://www.pbs.org/video/kcts-9-documentaries-circuit/ This reminds me of one I saw quite some time ago: The Toxic E-Waste Trade Killing Pakistan's Poorest ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=axYKPbr9_MA ) IMO it would be nice to have better circumstances for more Dr. Frankensteins putting more working machines together from scrap. That means big-name equipment and semiconductor manufa…

Did you try TaoBao or AliExpress? Sometimes you can get ICs there which major western resellers don't carry for one reason or another, although it can be a bit closer to eBay than Digikey.

Re: The dark side of electronic waste recycling

#37

Post by aalleavitch »

Something1234 wrote: post #21
toomuchtodo wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everything you mentioned as possible public policy is done for the benefit of the environment and the people who live in it, not shortsighted consumers. You’re not paying for it because it’s good for you, but because it harms others.

Well people act in their own self interest, so how do you propose that people go about implementing to encourage the lazy consume to take part? GP makes a very valid point, and I don't know why they are being downvoted. It's basic game theory. Maybe if the fee was given back to the consumer or split between them it might work. Like how bottle deposits used to work.

I already pay to recycle.

How has my clearly irrational behavior somehow defeated your ironclad game theory logic?

Re: The dark side of electronic waste recycling

#38

Post by gioele »

Accujack wrote: post #3
howmayiannoyyou wrote: post #2

Not defending Total Reclaim's misrepresentation BUT.... the market for many recyclable commodities is insufficient to justify processing expense in the US. Why? Two reasons. First, there's little manufacturing capacity remaining in North America to utilize many (not all) recyclable commodities. Second, subsidies and currency manipulation continue to dump virgin commodities and new products into the US. This is not a…

There's no for-profit motive to justify recycling of much, that's true. However, recycling can still work well if there's money built in to the price of items for recycling what they're made of. In other words, a surcharge built into the cost of e.g. a flatscreen monitor for recycling is held in escrow during the device's lifetime. When it's end of life, the company that recycles it can claim that charge as part of i…

> In other words, a surcharge built into the cost of e.g. a flatscreen monitor for recycling is held in escrow during the device's lifetime. When it's end of life, the company that recycles it can claim that charge as part of its fee for ensuring the materials are not improperly disposed of.

Something similar is done in Italy by CONAI [1], a private-but-public organization that collects small fees for each piece of packaging that the members (basically all factories) produce. This cost is carried on until the good is sold and the recycling facilities can claim it back. [2]

The mount of money per packaging is minuscule (I think in the order of a tenth of a Euro cent per m^2 cardboard, for example), but it has been enough to create an incentive to kick-start the whole recycling industry. The result: 88% recycling country-wide. [2]

[1] https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consorzio_nazionale_imballaggi [2] http://www.comieco.org/faq/

Re: The dark side of electronic waste recycling

#39

Post by dbtx »

leggomylibro wrote: post #36
dbtx wrote: post #34

PBS video buried in the article: https://www.pbs.org/video/kcts-9-documentaries-circuit/ This reminds me of one I saw quite some time ago: The Toxic E-Waste Trade Killing Pakistan's Poorest ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=axYKPbr9_MA ) IMO it would be nice to have better circumstances for more Dr. Frankensteins putting more working machines together from scrap. That means big-name equipment and semiconductor manufa…

Did you try TaoBao or AliExpress? Sometimes you can get ICs there which major western resellers don't carry for one reason or another, although it can be a bit closer to eBay than Digikey.

No, it never occurred to me, so I'll have to check. It'd be nice to resell a refurbished board to someone, someday... at least the connectors are all labeled, so testing it is still possible without the TV. Thanks for the tip.

Re: The dark side of electronic waste recycling

#40

Post by eeZah7Ux »

howmayiannoyyou wrote: post #2

Not defending Total Reclaim's misrepresentation BUT.... the market for many recyclable commodities is insufficient to justify processing expense in the US. Why? Two reasons. First, there's little manufacturing capacity remaining in North America to utilize many (not all) recyclable commodities. Second, subsidies and currency manipulation continue to dump virgin commodities and new products into the US. This is not a…

Step one: offshore labor-intensive and polluting production to a developing country.

Step two: blame them for pollution and producing cheaply.

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