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"It seems like every time you turn around a new and better smartphone or HDTV set goes on sale. That's great for consumers who are eager to upgrade to the latest gadgets but it's maybe not so good for the environment. The bad news is 60% of Americans are not recycling their old gadgets. The good news is that resellers and manufacturers are rising to the occasion and implementing their own recycling services. In this Gadget Census report we look at how consumers across the country are being green with gadgets and what is being done to help manage the growing number of devices that are turning into e-waste every day. "

The Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC) is an international organization created by Canada, Mexico and the United States under the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation (NAAEC). The CEC was established to address regional environmental concerns, help prevent potential trade and environmental conflicts, and to promote the effective enforcement of environmental law. The Agreement complements the environmental provisions of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). This section of the CEC site provides information on environmental laws in the U.S., Canada and Mexico.

American Plastics Council paper presented at Society of Plastics Engineers Annual Recycling Conference, November 2000; authors Michael M. Fisher, American Plastics Council, Michael B. Biddle, MBA Polymers, Inc., Tony Hainault, Minnesota Office of Environmental Assistance, Douglas S. Smith, Sony Electronics Inc., David J. Cauchi, Consultant, David A. Thompson, Matsushita Electric Corporation of America

American TV & Appliance has announced a multilevel electronics recycling initiative that allows the recycling of most electronics, much of it for no fee.

The most common cause of decreased vision after age 60 is age-related macular degeneration,

This fall (Oct. 15th,) Americans will receive rebates for swapping clunky home appliances for newer, green models

Dallas, Texas (PRWEB) September 4, 2009 -- Capstone Wireless, LLC is pleased to announce that the non-profit environmental watchdog Basel Action Network (BAN) has recognized Capstone Wireless as an e-Steward™ electronics recycler, a designation awarded to North American electronics recyclers and asset managers who have been qualified as upholding the highest standard of environmental and social responsibility.

"It's not much of a stretch to liken America's relationship with cells phones to a once sizzling romance that ends in goodbye. Fated love affairs typically begin with blind infatuation and fiery passion before reality sets in, cooling the embers enough to allow more guarded, sometimes less attractive aspects of the self to surface. Interest wanes until the love object is abandoned or replaced by an alluring new one. Americans relate to cell phones in much the same way. An old phone, with once novel features that drew fascination, is discarded with hardly a thought when an updated model makes it seem obsolete. That consumers replace cell phones about every two years makes this analogy seem less silly. A parallel can be drawn, too, between the innards of a cell phone and what is revealed when one person lets another peek inside: it's not all pretty. Some nasty materials lurk behind the bright shiny casing, making cell phone disposal a knotty environmental issue, analogous to ending, with minimal damages, a relationship gone sour. "

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.

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.

University of China is using ground-up circuit boards to strengthen cement