Group items tagged

The LG Eco-Mobilization Program is a free recycling solution for your old mobile phones and accessories, and could help answer your concerns about keeping the environment safe when tossing your phone. The LG Eco-Mobilization Program is a free recycling solution for your old mobile phones and accessories, and could help answer your concerns about keeping the environment safe when tossing your phone.

Scientific American, 7/17/09, article by Larry Greenemeier. Most people assume that their trash ends up in a landfill somewhere far away (if they think about this at all). But growing concern over the environmental impact of waste-discarded electronics, in particular-has prompted a team of researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to take a high-tech approach to studying exactly what people are tossing out and where those items are ending up. The researchers, part of MIT's Senseable City Lab, have developed electronic tags that they're hoping as many as 3,000 volunteers in Seattle and New York City will affix to different items they throw away this summer as part of the Trash Track program. These tags will contact cell phone towers they pass as they flow through the trash stream to their final destinations, helping the researchers monitor the patterns and costs of urban disposal.

WALLA WALLA -- If your New Year's resolution involves tossing an old computer or television set, you're in luck. A new state-sponsored program, E-Cycle Washington, begins this year to allow recycling of certain electronic items free of charge. Items covered by the program are computers, televisions, laptops and monitors, although some businesses may accept other items as well. The program is open to private citizens, nonprofits and businesses with fewer than 50 employees. Two local companies participating in the program are CEP Recycle and Walla Walla Recycling.

SPOKANE -- If you have old electronics collecting dust at home there's a free and green way in Washington now to get rid of all that unwanted clutter. Many of the electronics people use on a daily basis contain lead and mercury making it harmful to just toss them into a landfill. That's why a new state law requires makers of televisions, computers, laptops, and monitors to provide free e-cycling facilities.

America's TV stations will make a historic switch next month from analog to digital signals. But what promises to bring a sharper picture is also raising the curtain on a big environmental unknown across California: What will happen to the millions of old TV sets that no longer work? It's illegal to simply toss the estimated 2 million old TVs - chock-full of hazardous waste - into the garbage. "We're preparing for a tidal wave. We've already seen more televisions being donated and we expect to see more as the switch-over comes," said James David, a spokesman for Goodwill Industries of San Francisco, San Mateo and Marin Counties. On Feb. 17, older analog televisions that receive signals "over the air" from a rooftop antenna or with "rabbit ears" will stop working.

E-waste: search through any basement, attic or garage in America and you'll likely find some. Old computers and cell phones, your ancient TV that shows only a scratchy black-and-white picture, that broken printer. These are all examples of electronic waste, also known as e-waste - a booming facet of America's waste stream. Americans generate between 5 and 7 million tons of e-waste each year - and the amount is growing three times faster than other types of municipal waste, according to the Northeast Waste Management Officials Association. The association is a nonprofit interstate group of New England states - including New Hampshire - that coordinates waste and pollution prevention programs. Though e-waste itself isn't a new phenomenon, only within about the last eight years have states tried to grapple with how to properly dispose of electronics that contain chemicals harmful to the environment when simply tossed in a landfill or burned in an incinerator. New Hampshire is one of 18 states in the country to have a law regulating e-waste, and the law may soon get a little stricter.

It's Christmas morning, and there beneath the tree was your new television, sleek and digital. Or maybe it was a new computer. Or the newest electronic gee-whiz gadget. All well and good, but what are you going to do with the old equipment it replaces? Most people - about 88 percent according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency - simply toss so-called e-waste into the trash. Given the heavy metals and other toxic substances such equipment contains, that's obviously a bad idea, says the Electronics TakeBack Coalition, a national consortium of environmental and consumer groups. But, in some cases, doing the seemingly responsible thing - hauling outmoded equipment to a recycler - is as bad as junking it, warned Barbara Kyle, the group's national coordinator. Often, she said, "recycled" electronics are shipped to processors in developing countries, who use primitive techniques to extract valuable metals.

It's Christmas morning, and there beneath the tree was your new television, sleek and digital. Or maybe it was a new computer. Or the newest electronic gee-whiz gadget. All well and good, but what are you going to do with the old equipment it replaces? Most people - about 88 percent according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency - simply toss so-called e-waste into the trash. Given the heavy metals and other toxic substances such equipment contains, that's obviously a bad idea, says the Electronics TakeBack Coalition, a national consortium of environmental and consumer groups. But, in some cases, doing the seemingly responsible thing - hauling outmoded equipment to a recycler - is as bad as junking it, warned Barbara Kyle, the group's national coordinator. Often, she said, "recycled" electronics are shipped to processors in developing countries, who use primitive techniques to extract valuable metals.

KVUE News, Austin, TX, 6/23/09. Includes video with reporter Elise Hu. "Austin Democrat Kirk Watson says he's stunned by a veto from Governor Rick Perry of a bill that would have encouraged people to recycle their old TVs instead of throwing them out. Watson's measure would have called for manufacturers to take back their old sets. He says the manufacturers were OK with that, and that's why he's surprised Perry tossed it out. " Comments are interesting--people are perplexed as to why legislation would be necessary to encourage recycling; apparent ignorance of cost associated with electronics recycling.

Millions of printed circuit boards from discarded electronics are tossed into landfills every year. In addition to the volume of waste, the material can leach chemicals into the soil. As an alternative, researchers at Shanghai Jiao Tong University in China are finding various ways to reuse the panels, including as an additive in asphalt.