UK's Waste & Resources Action Programme (WARP) conducted a study of the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) content of Household Waste Recycling Centres (HWRCs). What can we learn, besides UK greens' fondness for initials? Turns out media, not IT, gear is the largest category. Upgrades are driving this waste stream.

All the naturally-occurring elements in the universe are forged in the cosmic fusion reactors we call stars. This is true of the atoms in our our bodies and of those in our e-gear. We are truly stardust.

The process of fusing atomic nuclei together to form ever-more-complex atoms is called 'nucleosynthesis'. Average stars like our sun can power basic reactions like fusing hydrogen into helium.

Follow our e-devices' global journeys on Greenpeace's interactive map and MIT's tracking animation.

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2011

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2011

ID-TELMIT 2012, billed as "Indonesia's Largest ICT & Media Convergence Conference & Expo", intends to cover how to "apply Information and Communication Technology (ICT) to other industrial fields such as Green Convergence, Smart Grid…" I see this as more evidence that the global ICT community is becoming increasingly focused on this opportunity.

LED-based lighting is touted as 'green' lighting and we have made positive note of its use in e-media facilities and other ICT applications. While it is true that Light-Emitting Diodes produce more lumens per watt that either incandescent or florescent technologies, lamp-to-lamp comparisons fall short when LEDs enable massive new energy consumption. A case in point is digital signage, where a single LED-based outdoor billboard can consume more energy than a typical US home.

The Chronicle of Higher Education reports "A group of seven graduate students, from Stanford University and Finland’s Aalto University, created a prototype of a recyclable laptop…the Bloom laptop…is made mostly of materials that can be recycled alongside ordinary household items, like metal, plastic, and glass. Materials like LCD screens and circuit boards, which need to be sent to specialized recycling facilities, can be easily separated in a few steps."

"Designed for the Dump" is the theme of The Story of Electronics, a cartoon from the The Story of Stuff Project and the Electronics Takeback Coalition. The video is a breezy but comprehensive tour of the issues inherent in the lifecycles of our e-gear. It would be a good starting point for Green ICT professionals to educate non-technical audiences. Take a look.

The US EPA has a program called Responsible Recycling (“R2”) Practices. R2 "is a set of [voluntary] guidelines for accredited certification programs to assess electronics recyclers’ environmental, worker health and safety, and security practices." An industry body, the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries, Inc, has responded by launching its R2/RIOS certification program.

The University of Illinois' Sustainable Electronics Initiative has published a suite of four documents of e-Waste Terms and Definitions. How well do they reflect the current state of the global e-waste discussion?