Good Bye Old computer!
by Reinhard Hoenighaus, Hamburg, Germany

With the wave of PC-boom the mountains of toxic e-waste will also grow.  The EU directives will force the manufacturers as of August 2005 to engage in recycling and utilization of the old electronic appliances. Thus the manufacturers, communities and recycling industry should get together to work out the bases of cooperation for the recycling sector, estimated to worth millions.

1.8 tons of water, chemicals and fuel is needed in order to produce a standard computer with monitor. Apart from this enormous resources consumption, the worldwide computer boom produced a second problem: poisonous electronics scrap. Therefore the EU demands that old electronic devices as of August 2005 should not land up on garbage dumps.

The IT sector reacted. Approximately 120 hardware-manufacturers alone in Germany already got together to regulate the waste disposal jointly. While industry and community are discussing the issue, who is liable for which costs, recycling-businesses hope for a bright future and a million-heavy new market.

Computers are made up of many poisonous components

All over the world more than 1 billion computers are in use now, and each year 130 million new PCs are sold. Estimates of environmental organizations show that by the year 2007, 500 million computers will be obsolete and useless. In the USA old electronic scrap is exported through various strange ways for them to land up in poorer regions of India, Pakistan and China - to the detriment of humans and nature. As we know monitors contain cadmium and lead, and in the motherboards there are arsenic and bromides, and in the batteries - mercury.

Unlike in the EU, in the US there are no prohibitions and restrictions to export of old electronic gadgets. Activists are quite upset about this as they feel that export of old electronics is the dirty secret of the hi-tech revolution. Hi-tech sector and the governments are closing their eyes, while unscrupulous traders engage in transporting this waste to third world countries, and also proudly call their enterprises as recycling enterprises, as shows a study by the US-Organ³sat³on S³l³con Valley Tox³cs Coal³t³on. The latter unconditionally approve EU intiative of ecologically conscious utilization of e-waste and old electronics scrap.

Manufacturers and communities - in charge of recycling

In Germany the Ministry of Ecology, manufacturers and communities at present are debating the issue of implementing the EU directive into practice. One of the decisions taken (still under finalization) by the Federal Ministry of Ecology, is that the communities should collect and make the preliminary sorting of e-scrap, while the manufacturers should engage in their recycling. But many communities are against this additional burden on them, and are demanding money from the industries and manufacturers for meeting their costs. The manufacturers, in their turn, are already not happy about the costs of recycling: "Creation of this system will cost the IT and telecommunications sector 100 million Euros per year." - says Mario Tobias, environmental issues expert at Bitkom.

Uniting efforts in recycling, 120 manufacturers and exporters of electronic devices in mid 2003 organized a Clearing House (center for recycling), some kind of a register of old electronic equipment (Elektro- Altgeraete Register - EAR). This way they would like to stay away from any tendency of monopolization, of the type Duales System or chaos in the case of deposits for metallic cans. "Enterprises took up their share of responsibility, says Karl Heinz Florence, recycling expert in the European parliament from the Christian Democratic Union of Germany.

Corporate liability: Samsung recycling Grundig TV sets

This Clearing house functions in the following way: enterprises report how many computers, monitors and television sets they have supplied. Based on this data, the EAR determines their share (segment) in the market of any particular goods, and from this emerges the quantity of old equipment, which the particular enterprise is obliged to collect and recycle from the community collection points.

In this way it is also ensured that, the "orphaned" appliances and equipment are also recycled. For example, items produced by Telefunken, which does not exist any more, will also be taken care of. Samsung, following this rule, will have to recycle old products of Grundig as Samsung holds a big share in the market of TV sets.

Recycling market worth 350-500 million Euro

Recycling sector is yet to create the required capacity for processing heaps of e-waste. Observers see a greater need to catch up. "The infrastructure is not yet in place", according to PR consultant Michael Krug, representing the interests of Hewlett-Packard on ecological issues. It is also necessary to work out standards for smaller items, so that they could be re-used in production as raw material.

In any case, the EU directive gives recycling sector enterprises a chance: value of the market is estimated at 350-500 million Euros annually. Here, along with the so-called "gray" scrap (computers and printers), "white" (refrigerators and washing machines) and "brown" (musical centers etc.) wastes are also included. In Germany alone, the volume of the above-mentioned waste will account for 1.1 million ton annually.

Resale instead of Recycle

Putting aside the costly process of recycling, Hewlett-Packard has come up with another idea: resale of these appliances, which were in use before. The components are re-assembled again and this prolongs the life of a computer. For example, a standard PC with a Pentium processor, which was in vogue in Europe 2-3 years ago, could be purchased for 50 Euros in Ukraine today. It is hard to believe, but it is real business. By remarketing and reselling alone HP can enjoy a turnover of 1 billion dollars annually. The question however is: where will that PC worth 50-Euro land up, when it gets old and obsolete in Ukraine? – Only into the garbage dump!