Organised crime targets waste recycling
It was meant to clear up the problem of electronic waste, but an EU directive on recycling is being flagrantly abused in the UK
* Pete Warren
* guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 8 July 2009 20.00 BST
Dirty deals … some firms are disguising broken machines as functional and illegally shipping them to Africa to be stripped for parts. Photograph: Owen Humphreys/PA
Organised crime has moved into the recycling industry - a development that has become clear over the past few months after a series of raids to enforce the EU's Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive .
In a raid at the start of June, police and officials from the Environment Agency targeted two east London locations - a farm at Upminster and an industrial site at Rainham - and forced open around 500 containers full of old computers, monitors, fridges and assorted electrical waste destined for illegal export to Africa, where it would be stripped down for raw materials.
"Our investigations have found that the majority of this equipment is beyond repair and is being stripped down under appalling conditions in Africa. But the law is clear - electrical waste must be recycled in the UK, not sent to developing countries in Africa where unsafe dismantling puts human health and the environment at risk," said the Environment Agency's national enforcement service project manager, Chris Smith.
"The Environment Agency has created a national team to stamp out this illegal trade and strong intelligence work has resulted in today's operation - the most significant action to date in investigating suspected electrical waste being shipped to Africa."
During the raid, in which 50 people were questioned, other more tell-tale signs of organised crime came to light from the containers: stolen motorbikes, a cherry-picker crane, a dumper truck, a suspected illegal immigrant, a steamroller, stolen import documentation and £80,000 worth of vodka and cigarettes.
Organised crime's involvement in the scrap metal business is the stuff of Hollywood legend, and its interest in computers has been developing hand in hand with the industry. Computer chips have long been a target for crime gangs, who have even gone so far as breaking into office blocks and ripping chips out of systems, but the systematic attempts to flout the WEEE directive are cause for real environmental concern.
The prize is the gold, copper, steel and other metals that can be reclaimed from the electrical waste.
Toxic exports
"It's a really ugly picture of what's happening on a massive scale," said Ted Smith, a noted US environmental activist who has been giving evidence to the US Senate on the issue. "Around 50-80% of all of the material collected in the US is making its way abroad and significant amounts from the UK and Europe."
The impact of the trade on the developing world in terms of the environment and human health is appalling. In Africa, China and India, young children are used to recover tiny amounts of metal.
"Chips are removed from circuit boards over open fires and give off lead fumes in the process," said Smith. "Children are digging out carbon black from toner cartridges. Other components are put into acid baths in sweat shops. In lots of parts of the world, the reclamation takes place by the side of ditches and rivers and poisonous chemicals leach into the environment. In China, children are already being found with high levels of chemicals in their blood."
The illegal trade of waste abroad is on the increase. Flagrant abuse of the WEEE directive in the UK has meant that rather than waste being recycled here, broken electrical equipment is dumped in containers and labelled as functional. To camouflage the broken material, working objects are then placed on the top of the unusable equipment to put off officials.
"This is not a situation where someone does not understand the rules, it is deliberate," said Adrian Harding, the EA's policy adviser for producer responsibility.
A cursory examination of the recycling industry reveals how deliberate the scams are. When the UK decided to belatedly enforce the directive two years ago (it became law in 2003), 500 companies joined what they thought was a valuable market, some not realising that many of the more lucrative scrap items, such as cookers, were already being removed by local authorities and others.
Before the rules were implemented it was estimated that households generated around 900,000 tonnes of relevant waste a year, and businesses 750,000 tonnes.
"Two years into the WEEE directive the actual amount of WEEE being recorded is around a third of what was projected," said Euan Jackson, managing director of recycling for the waste company Wincanton.
"WEEE is still being sent via unauthorised routes such as being exported for 'reuse', or being mixed in with general scrap to generate a revenue stream for organisations with vested interests."
Much waste is also not making it to the right places. "The statistics have proved the prevalent abuse of regulations to allow unscrupulous businesses and authorities to sweep WEEE under the carpet to the detriment of the environment," said Jon Godfrey, director of Sims Recycling Solutions, which runs Europe's largest recycling facility for such material.
With the collapse in metal prices after the recession, many companies have gone into administration and others are feeling the financial pressure. Some of the larger players have invested heavily in equipment and have engaged in research and development to be able to safely reclaim virtually all of the materials from electronic items. They claim that the development of an efficient industry is now being prevented by criminals - and the compliance schemes the UK government has set up.
In most other European countries, there are around three schemes, while in the UK there are 40 - many of which are meant to buy waste and recycle it on behalf of particular manufacturing sectors, such as the mobile phone industry.
Shady scrap
The problem, according to the bigger players, is that those groups have a vested interest in paying the cheapest price for that process and there is no cost to recycle equipment that has been marked as working and reusable. Enter the shadier side of the scrap metal business.
"One of the problems with this is business at large," says Harding. "It would be very useful if businesses ensured that their electrical waste was going to the right place." And it is not just business; the general public is also at fault - only 20% of our mobile phones, 14% of our TVs, 10% of our computers and 9% of our toasters and vacuum cleaners make it to the dump.
While other household items such as electric toothbrushes, battery-operated watches, electronic toys and hedge clippers are rarely recycled, most items end up being thrown out with the household rubbish, where it leaches into the UK's environment.
* guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media Limited 2009
Go to:
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
LET'S GO MAFIA!
Organised crime targets waste recycling
It was meant to clear up the problem of electronic waste, but an EU directive on recycling is being flagrantly abused in the UK
* Pete Warren
* guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 8 July 2009 20.00 BST
Dirty deals … some firms are disguising broken machines as functional and illegally shipping them to Africa to be stripped for parts. Photograph: Owen Humphreys/PA
Organised crime has moved into the recycling industry - a development that has become clear over the past few months after a series of raids to enforce the EU's Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive .
In a raid at the start of June, police and officials from the Environment Agency targeted two east London locations - a farm at Upminster and an industrial site at Rainham - and forced open around 500 containers full of old computers, monitors, fridges and assorted electrical waste destined for illegal export to Africa, where it would be stripped down for raw materials.
"Our investigations have found that the majority of this equipment is beyond repair and is being stripped down under appalling conditions in Africa. But the law is clear - electrical waste must be recycled in the UK, not sent to developing countries in Africa where unsafe dismantling puts human health and the environment at risk," said the Environment Agency's national enforcement service project manager, Chris Smith.
"The Environment Agency has created a national team to stamp out this illegal trade and strong intelligence work has resulted in today's operation - the most significant action to date in investigating suspected electrical waste being shipped to Africa."
During the raid, in which 50 people were questioned, other more tell-tale signs of organised crime came to light from the containers: stolen motorbikes, a cherry-picker crane, a dumper truck, a suspected illegal immigrant, a steamroller, stolen import documentation and £80,000 worth of vodka and cigarettes.
Organised crime's involvement in the scrap metal business is the stuff of Hollywood legend, and its interest in computers has been developing hand in hand with the industry. Computer chips have long been a target for crime gangs, who have even gone so far as breaking into office blocks and ripping chips out of systems, but the systematic attempts to flout the WEEE directive are cause for real environmental concern.
The prize is the gold, copper, steel and other metals that can be reclaimed from the electrical waste.
Toxic exports
"It's a really ugly picture of what's happening on a massive scale," said Ted Smith, a noted US environmental activist who has been giving evidence to the US Senate on the issue. "Around 50-80% of all of the material collected in the US is making its way abroad and significant amounts from the UK and Europe."
The impact of the trade on the developing world in terms of the environment and human health is appalling. In Africa, China and India, young children are used to recover tiny amounts of metal.
"Chips are removed from circuit boards over open fires and give off lead fumes in the process," said Smith. "Children are digging out carbon black from toner cartridges. Other components are put into acid baths in sweat shops. In lots of parts of the world, the reclamation takes place by the side of ditches and rivers and poisonous chemicals leach into the environment. In China, children are already being found with high levels of chemicals in their blood."
The illegal trade of waste abroad is on the increase. Flagrant abuse of the WEEE directive in the UK has meant that rather than waste being recycled here, broken electrical equipment is dumped in containers and labelled as functional. To camouflage the broken material, working objects are then placed on the top of the unusable equipment to put off officials.
"This is not a situation where someone does not understand the rules, it is deliberate," said Adrian Harding, the EA's policy adviser for producer responsibility.
A cursory examination of the recycling industry reveals how deliberate the scams are. When the UK decided to belatedly enforce the directive two years ago (it became law in 2003), 500 companies joined what they thought was a valuable market, some not realising that many of the more lucrative scrap items, such as cookers, were already being removed by local authorities and others.
Before the rules were implemented it was estimated that households generated around 900,000 tonnes of relevant waste a year, and businesses 750,000 tonnes.
"Two years into the WEEE directive the actual amount of WEEE being recorded is around a third of what was projected," said Euan Jackson, managing director of recycling for the waste company Wincanton.
"WEEE is still being sent via unauthorised routes such as being exported for 'reuse', or being mixed in with general scrap to generate a revenue stream for organisations with vested interests."
Much waste is also not making it to the right places. "The statistics have proved the prevalent abuse of regulations to allow unscrupulous businesses and authorities to sweep WEEE under the carpet to the detriment of the environment," said Jon Godfrey, director of Sims Recycling Solutions, which runs Europe's largest recycling facility for such material.
With the collapse in metal prices after the recession, many companies have gone into administration and others are feeling the financial pressure. Some of the larger players have invested heavily in equipment and have engaged in research and development to be able to safely reclaim virtually all of the materials from electronic items. They claim that the development of an efficient industry is now being prevented by criminals - and the compliance schemes the UK government has set up.
In most other European countries, there are around three schemes, while in the UK there are 40 - many of which are meant to buy waste and recycle it on behalf of particular manufacturing sectors, such as the mobile phone industry.
Shady scrap
The problem, according to the bigger players, is that those groups have a vested interest in paying the cheapest price for that process and there is no cost to recycle equipment that has been marked as working and reusable. Enter the shadier side of the scrap metal business.
"One of the problems with this is business at large," says Harding. "It would be very useful if businesses ensured that their electrical waste was going to the right place." And it is not just business; the general public is also at fault - only 20% of our mobile phones, 14% of our TVs, 10% of our computers and 9% of our toasters and vacuum cleaners make it to the dump.
While other household items such as electric toothbrushes, battery-operated watches, electronic toys and hedge clippers are rarely recycled, most items end up being thrown out with the household rubbish, where it leaches into the UK's environment.
* guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media Limited 2009
Go to:
It was meant to clear up the problem of electronic waste, but an EU directive on recycling is being flagrantly abused in the UK
* Pete Warren
* guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 8 July 2009 20.00 BST
Dirty deals … some firms are disguising broken machines as functional and illegally shipping them to Africa to be stripped for parts. Photograph: Owen Humphreys/PA
Organised crime has moved into the recycling industry - a development that has become clear over the past few months after a series of raids to enforce the EU's Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive .
In a raid at the start of June, police and officials from the Environment Agency targeted two east London locations - a farm at Upminster and an industrial site at Rainham - and forced open around 500 containers full of old computers, monitors, fridges and assorted electrical waste destined for illegal export to Africa, where it would be stripped down for raw materials.
"Our investigations have found that the majority of this equipment is beyond repair and is being stripped down under appalling conditions in Africa. But the law is clear - electrical waste must be recycled in the UK, not sent to developing countries in Africa where unsafe dismantling puts human health and the environment at risk," said the Environment Agency's national enforcement service project manager, Chris Smith.
"The Environment Agency has created a national team to stamp out this illegal trade and strong intelligence work has resulted in today's operation - the most significant action to date in investigating suspected electrical waste being shipped to Africa."
During the raid, in which 50 people were questioned, other more tell-tale signs of organised crime came to light from the containers: stolen motorbikes, a cherry-picker crane, a dumper truck, a suspected illegal immigrant, a steamroller, stolen import documentation and £80,000 worth of vodka and cigarettes.
Organised crime's involvement in the scrap metal business is the stuff of Hollywood legend, and its interest in computers has been developing hand in hand with the industry. Computer chips have long been a target for crime gangs, who have even gone so far as breaking into office blocks and ripping chips out of systems, but the systematic attempts to flout the WEEE directive are cause for real environmental concern.
The prize is the gold, copper, steel and other metals that can be reclaimed from the electrical waste.
Toxic exports
"It's a really ugly picture of what's happening on a massive scale," said Ted Smith, a noted US environmental activist who has been giving evidence to the US Senate on the issue. "Around 50-80% of all of the material collected in the US is making its way abroad and significant amounts from the UK and Europe."
The impact of the trade on the developing world in terms of the environment and human health is appalling. In Africa, China and India, young children are used to recover tiny amounts of metal.
"Chips are removed from circuit boards over open fires and give off lead fumes in the process," said Smith. "Children are digging out carbon black from toner cartridges. Other components are put into acid baths in sweat shops. In lots of parts of the world, the reclamation takes place by the side of ditches and rivers and poisonous chemicals leach into the environment. In China, children are already being found with high levels of chemicals in their blood."
The illegal trade of waste abroad is on the increase. Flagrant abuse of the WEEE directive in the UK has meant that rather than waste being recycled here, broken electrical equipment is dumped in containers and labelled as functional. To camouflage the broken material, working objects are then placed on the top of the unusable equipment to put off officials.
"This is not a situation where someone does not understand the rules, it is deliberate," said Adrian Harding, the EA's policy adviser for producer responsibility.
A cursory examination of the recycling industry reveals how deliberate the scams are. When the UK decided to belatedly enforce the directive two years ago (it became law in 2003), 500 companies joined what they thought was a valuable market, some not realising that many of the more lucrative scrap items, such as cookers, were already being removed by local authorities and others.
Before the rules were implemented it was estimated that households generated around 900,000 tonnes of relevant waste a year, and businesses 750,000 tonnes.
"Two years into the WEEE directive the actual amount of WEEE being recorded is around a third of what was projected," said Euan Jackson, managing director of recycling for the waste company Wincanton.
"WEEE is still being sent via unauthorised routes such as being exported for 'reuse', or being mixed in with general scrap to generate a revenue stream for organisations with vested interests."
Much waste is also not making it to the right places. "The statistics have proved the prevalent abuse of regulations to allow unscrupulous businesses and authorities to sweep WEEE under the carpet to the detriment of the environment," said Jon Godfrey, director of Sims Recycling Solutions, which runs Europe's largest recycling facility for such material.
With the collapse in metal prices after the recession, many companies have gone into administration and others are feeling the financial pressure. Some of the larger players have invested heavily in equipment and have engaged in research and development to be able to safely reclaim virtually all of the materials from electronic items. They claim that the development of an efficient industry is now being prevented by criminals - and the compliance schemes the UK government has set up.
In most other European countries, there are around three schemes, while in the UK there are 40 - many of which are meant to buy waste and recycle it on behalf of particular manufacturing sectors, such as the mobile phone industry.
Shady scrap
The problem, according to the bigger players, is that those groups have a vested interest in paying the cheapest price for that process and there is no cost to recycle equipment that has been marked as working and reusable. Enter the shadier side of the scrap metal business.
"One of the problems with this is business at large," says Harding. "It would be very useful if businesses ensured that their electrical waste was going to the right place." And it is not just business; the general public is also at fault - only 20% of our mobile phones, 14% of our TVs, 10% of our computers and 9% of our toasters and vacuum cleaners make it to the dump.
While other household items such as electric toothbrushes, battery-operated watches, electronic toys and hedge clippers are rarely recycled, most items end up being thrown out with the household rubbish, where it leaches into the UK's environment.
* guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media Limited 2009
Go to:
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Fabulous!
Listen to William Shatner putting the boot into HP--fabulous. Another good, decent Canadian Shakespearian strikes a blow.
http://www.greenpeace.org/international/news/hp-reminder-28-07-09
http://www.greenpeace.org/international/news/hp-reminder-28-07-09
reactionary cnet's doug ngo on greenpeace and hewlett packard
July 28, 2009 11:38 AM PDT
Greenpeace wars with HP
by Dong Ngo
Editors' note: This article was updated at 2:50 p.m. PDT with HP's statement.
It's war on hazardous chemicals that Greenpeace single-handedly provoked Tuesday.
After rating Hewlett-Packard low on its Green Meter did little to convince the company to change its ways, the organization decided to resort to trespassing.
It sent activists to HP's global headquarters in Palo Alto, Calif., where they climbed on top of the building and painted a gigantic message announcing "Hazardous Products," using nontoxic children's finger paint. The message covered more than 11,500 square feet, which is about the size of two and half basketball courts.
According to Greenpeace, the organization took this action because HP broke its promise to eliminate hazardous chemicals in its products. Earlier this year, HP postponed its 2007 commitment to phase out dangerous substances, such as brominated flame retardants (BFRs) and polyvinyl chloride (PVC) plastics, from its computing products. The delay shifts compliance up two years, from 2009 to 2011.
PVC and BFRs are highly toxic, and can release dioxin when burned, a chemical known to cause cancer.
Apart from the graffiti, HP employees were also greeted today by automated phone calls from actor William Shatner, calling upon the company to phase out the toxic chemicals.
In reply to CNET News' phone call seeking comments on Greenpeace's action, HP released this statement via an e-mail:
For decades HP has been a leader in environmental responsibility and has adopted practices in product development, operations, and supply chain that are transparent and help to reduce its environmental impact. HP has a comprehensive approach to environmental sustainability, with three main components: minimizing our impact; helping our customers to improve their environmental performance; and driving towards a sustainable, low-carbon economy.
This commitment includes reducing the use of BFR/PVC in our products until these materials are eliminated entirely. HP has introduced several new computing products this year that use less BFR/PVC than previous generations. This September, HP will release a BFR/PVC free notebook. By fall 2010 all new commercial PC products released will be BFR/PVC free. By the end of 2011, all new PC products released will be free of BFR/PVCs.
The unconstructive antics at HP's headquarters today did nothing to advance the goals that all who care about the environment share. HP will continue its efforts to develop new products and programs around the globe that help the company, its business partners, and customers conserve energy, reduce materials use, and reduce waste through responsible reuse and recycling. HP supports industry efforts to eliminate BFR and PVC because of potential e-waste issues. HP is a worldwide leader in e-waste recycling. HP has recycled 1 billion pounds of electronic products from 1987 to 2007 and has committed to recycling another billion pounds between 2008 and 2011.
Earlier this year, Greenpeace released a report that rated PC makers and other electronic vendors in regard to their compliance with e-waste elimination. Apple was ranked highest among PC makers and HP was one of the lowest, together with Dell and Lenovo.
Obviously, it's very important to eliminate e-waste and care about the environment. However, it's also important to understand that putting graffiti on private properties is a type of vandalism. I guess Greenpeace doesn't care about this.
Looks like it's a war that nobody wins.
Greenpeace wars with HP
by Dong Ngo
Editors' note: This article was updated at 2:50 p.m. PDT with HP's statement.
It's war on hazardous chemicals that Greenpeace single-handedly provoked Tuesday.
After rating Hewlett-Packard low on its Green Meter did little to convince the company to change its ways, the organization decided to resort to trespassing.
It sent activists to HP's global headquarters in Palo Alto, Calif., where they climbed on top of the building and painted a gigantic message announcing "Hazardous Products," using nontoxic children's finger paint. The message covered more than 11,500 square feet, which is about the size of two and half basketball courts.
According to Greenpeace, the organization took this action because HP broke its promise to eliminate hazardous chemicals in its products. Earlier this year, HP postponed its 2007 commitment to phase out dangerous substances, such as brominated flame retardants (BFRs) and polyvinyl chloride (PVC) plastics, from its computing products. The delay shifts compliance up two years, from 2009 to 2011.
PVC and BFRs are highly toxic, and can release dioxin when burned, a chemical known to cause cancer.
Apart from the graffiti, HP employees were also greeted today by automated phone calls from actor William Shatner, calling upon the company to phase out the toxic chemicals.
In reply to CNET News' phone call seeking comments on Greenpeace's action, HP released this statement via an e-mail:
For decades HP has been a leader in environmental responsibility and has adopted practices in product development, operations, and supply chain that are transparent and help to reduce its environmental impact. HP has a comprehensive approach to environmental sustainability, with three main components: minimizing our impact; helping our customers to improve their environmental performance; and driving towards a sustainable, low-carbon economy.
This commitment includes reducing the use of BFR/PVC in our products until these materials are eliminated entirely. HP has introduced several new computing products this year that use less BFR/PVC than previous generations. This September, HP will release a BFR/PVC free notebook. By fall 2010 all new commercial PC products released will be BFR/PVC free. By the end of 2011, all new PC products released will be free of BFR/PVCs.
The unconstructive antics at HP's headquarters today did nothing to advance the goals that all who care about the environment share. HP will continue its efforts to develop new products and programs around the globe that help the company, its business partners, and customers conserve energy, reduce materials use, and reduce waste through responsible reuse and recycling. HP supports industry efforts to eliminate BFR and PVC because of potential e-waste issues. HP is a worldwide leader in e-waste recycling. HP has recycled 1 billion pounds of electronic products from 1987 to 2007 and has committed to recycling another billion pounds between 2008 and 2011.
Earlier this year, Greenpeace released a report that rated PC makers and other electronic vendors in regard to their compliance with e-waste elimination. Apple was ranked highest among PC makers and HP was one of the lowest, together with Dell and Lenovo.
Obviously, it's very important to eliminate e-waste and care about the environment. However, it's also important to understand that putting graffiti on private properties is a type of vandalism. I guess Greenpeace doesn't care about this.
Looks like it's a war that nobody wins.
Monday, July 27, 2009
FASCINATING LEGISLATIVE & LEGAL STRUGGLES
In lawsuit, NYC's electronics recycling law is called irrational
Tech industry groups say law is illegal, seek injunction; Environmental group asks, What's the alternative?
Patrick Thibodeau
July 27, 2009 (Computerworld) WASHINGTON - If you have a big 20-year-old TV in your basement, then New York City's new electronic recycling law may help with the spring cleaning. All you'll need to do is contact the manufacturer, which will be required to remove it, and probably send over a delivery truck to pick it up for free.
Two industry groups that represent electronic makers are livid about the law, and in a federal lawsuit filed (PDF format)Friday, they argue that there is no way that they should be responsible for recycling all the electronics ever made, or at least what survives under the beds and in the closets of millions of NYC residents.
The E-waste program requires manufacturers to collect from residents any electronics that weigh more than 15 pounds. The law applies to all previously purchased electronics. The potential amount of e-waste in NYC amounts to an estimated 1.3 million televisions, computers and other electronic equipment totaling 47.9 million pounds annually, according to the lawsuit. Items weighing less than 15 pounds will be either mailed-back or left at a drop-off point established by a manufacturer.
The law was passed in 2008 and is due to take effect next year. The exact date is contingent on city approval of manufacturer recycling plans. The law will prohibit NYC residents from disposing of electronic waste in the trash.
For electronics makers, the law "will have an absolutely staggering impact," said Rick Goss, vice president of environment and sustainability for one of the two groups filing the lawsuit, the Information Technology Industry Council, whose members include IBM, Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft, Intel, Advanced Micro Devices, and other major tech vendors. Many vendors already have their own recycling programs, such as HP's trash-to-cash program.
The trade groups estimate it will cost manufacturers more than $200 million annually to comply with NYC's law. The Consumer Electronic Association is the other group involved.
The lawsuit contends NYC's recycling is "illegal and unconstitutional," "unprecedented," and "without any rational basis." It is seeking a temporary injunction while the case is considered.
One person who supports the law is Kate Sinding, senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) in New York. Taking up the example of making the manufacturer responsible for disposing of a 20-year-old TV, Sinding, said "I'm not exactly sure what's wrong with that." If the old TV gets picked up by the sanitation trucks, smashed and thrown into a landfill, "is that better?" she said. As far as collecting from residences, the manufacturers can arrange to do it in coordinated fashion to cut the expense, and the cost of the recycling can be included in the equipment cost. The reason for making manufacturers cover the costs is "so they think about how they are designing the products in the first place," Sinding said. She said the law is comparable to recycling laws in Minnesota and Illinois.
Businesses of fewer than 50 employees will be able to get their electronic goods recycled under the provisions of this law, but companies with more than 50 employees will have to pay for removal of electronic waste. The lawsuit was filed in the Southern District of New York.
Tech industry groups say law is illegal, seek injunction; Environmental group asks, What's the alternative?
Patrick Thibodeau
July 27, 2009 (Computerworld) WASHINGTON - If you have a big 20-year-old TV in your basement, then New York City's new electronic recycling law may help with the spring cleaning. All you'll need to do is contact the manufacturer, which will be required to remove it, and probably send over a delivery truck to pick it up for free.
Two industry groups that represent electronic makers are livid about the law, and in a federal lawsuit filed (PDF format)Friday, they argue that there is no way that they should be responsible for recycling all the electronics ever made, or at least what survives under the beds and in the closets of millions of NYC residents.
The E-waste program requires manufacturers to collect from residents any electronics that weigh more than 15 pounds. The law applies to all previously purchased electronics. The potential amount of e-waste in NYC amounts to an estimated 1.3 million televisions, computers and other electronic equipment totaling 47.9 million pounds annually, according to the lawsuit. Items weighing less than 15 pounds will be either mailed-back or left at a drop-off point established by a manufacturer.
The law was passed in 2008 and is due to take effect next year. The exact date is contingent on city approval of manufacturer recycling plans. The law will prohibit NYC residents from disposing of electronic waste in the trash.
For electronics makers, the law "will have an absolutely staggering impact," said Rick Goss, vice president of environment and sustainability for one of the two groups filing the lawsuit, the Information Technology Industry Council, whose members include IBM, Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft, Intel, Advanced Micro Devices, and other major tech vendors. Many vendors already have their own recycling programs, such as HP's trash-to-cash program.
The trade groups estimate it will cost manufacturers more than $200 million annually to comply with NYC's law. The Consumer Electronic Association is the other group involved.
The lawsuit contends NYC's recycling is "illegal and unconstitutional," "unprecedented," and "without any rational basis." It is seeking a temporary injunction while the case is considered.
One person who supports the law is Kate Sinding, senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) in New York. Taking up the example of making the manufacturer responsible for disposing of a 20-year-old TV, Sinding, said "I'm not exactly sure what's wrong with that." If the old TV gets picked up by the sanitation trucks, smashed and thrown into a landfill, "is that better?" she said. As far as collecting from residences, the manufacturers can arrange to do it in coordinated fashion to cut the expense, and the cost of the recycling can be included in the equipment cost. The reason for making manufacturers cover the costs is "so they think about how they are designing the products in the first place," Sinding said. She said the law is comparable to recycling laws in Minnesota and Illinois.
Businesses of fewer than 50 employees will be able to get their electronic goods recycled under the provisions of this law, but companies with more than 50 employees will have to pay for removal of electronic waste. The lawsuit was filed in the Southern District of New York.
Saturday, July 25, 2009
EVERY DEVICE PROMISES MORE---FOR LESS--AND?
BBC NEWS
Wireless power system shown off
By Jonathan Fildes
Technology reporter, BBC News, Oxford
A system that can deliver power to devices without the need for wires has been shown off at a hi-tech conference.
The technique exploits simple physics and can be used to charge a range of electronic devices over many metres.
Eric Giler, chief executive of US firm Witricity, showed mobile phones and televisions charging wirelessly at the TED Global conference in Oxford.
He said the system could replace the miles of expensive power cables and billions of disposable batteries.
"There is something like 40 billion disposable batteries built every year for power that, generally speaking, is used within a few inches or feet of where there is very inexpensive power," he said.
Trillions of dollars, he said, had also been invested building an infrastructure of wires "to get power from where it is created to where it is used."
"We love this stuff [electricity] so much," he said.
Mr Giler showed off a Google G1 phone and an Apple iPhone that could be charged using the system.
Witricity, he said, had managed to pack all the necessary components into the body of the G1 phone, but Apple had made that process slightly harder.
"They don't make it easy at Apple to get inside their phones so we put a little sleeve on the back," he said.
He also showed off a commercially available television using the system.
"Imagine you get one of these things and you want to hang it on the wall," he said. "Think about it, you don't want those ugly cords hanging down."
Good vibrations
The system is based on work by physicist Marin Soljacic at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
It exploits "resonance", whereby energy transfer is markedly more efficient when a certain frequency is applied.
When two objects have the same resonant frequency, they exchange energy strongly without having an effect on other, surrounding objects.
For example, it is resonance that can cause a wine glass to explode when a singer hits exactly the right tone.
But instead of using acoustic resonance, Witricity's approach exploits the resonance of low frequency electromagnetic waves.
HOW WIRELESS POWER WORKS
# 1. Magnetic coil (Antenna A) is housed in a box and can be set in wall or ceiling.
# 2. Antenna A, powered by mains, resonates at a specific frequency.
# 3. Electromagnetic waves transmitted through the air.
# 4. Second magnetic coil (Antenna B) fitted in laptop/TV etc resonates at same frequency as first coil and absorbs energy.
# 5. Energy charges the device.
The system uses two coils - one plugged into the mains and the other embedded or attached to the gadget.
Each coil is carefully engineered with the same resonant frequency. When the main coil is connected to an electricity supply, the magnetic field it produces is resonant with that of with the second coil, allowing "tails" of energy to flow between them.
As each "cycle" of energy arrives at the second coil, a voltage begins to build up that can be used to charge the gadget.
Mr Giler said the main coil could be embedded in the "ceiling, in the floor, or underneath your desktop".
Devices using the system would automatically begin to charge as soon as they were within range, he said.
"You'd never have to worry about plugging these things in again."
Safety concerns
Mr Giler was keen to stress the safety of the equipment during the demonstration.
"There's nothing going on - I'm OK," he said walking around a television running on wireless power.
The system is able to operate safely because the energy is largely transferred through magnetic fields.
"Humans and the vast majority of objects around us are non-magnetic in nature," Professor Soljacic, one of the inventors of the system, told BBC News during a visit to Witricity earlier this year.
It is able to do this by exploiting an effect that occurs in a region known as the "far field", the region seen at a distance of more than one wavelength from the device.
In this field, a transmitter would emit mixture of magnetic and potentially dangerous electric fields.
But, crucially, at a distance of less than one wavelength - the "near field" - it is almost entirely magnetic.
Hence, Witricity uses low frequency electromagnetic waves, whose waves are about 30m (100ft) long. Shorter wavelengths would not work.
'Ridiculous technology'
Witricity is not the first jump on the concept of wireless electricity.
For example, the nineteenth century American inventor Thomas Edison and physicist and engineer Nikola Tesla explored the concept.
"In the very early days of electricity before the electric grid was deployed [they] were very interested in developing a scheme to transmit electricity wirelessly over long distances," explained Professor Soljacic.
"They couldn't imagine dragging this vast infrastructure of metallic wires across every continent."
Tesla even went so far as to build a 29m-high aerial known as Wardenclyffe Tower in New York.
"It ran into some financial troubles and that work was never completed," said Professor Soljacic.
Today, chip-giant Intel has seized on a similar idea to Witricity's, whilst other companies work on highly directional mechanisms of energy transfer, such as lasers.
However, unlike Witricity's work, lasers require an uninterrupted line of sight, and are therefore not good for powering objects around the home.
In contrast, Mr Giler said Witricity's approach could be used for a range of applications from laptops and phones to implanted medical devices and electric cars.
"Imagine driving in the garage and the car charges itself," he said.
He even said he had had interest from a company who proposed to use the system for an "electrically-heated dog bowl".
"You go from the sublime to the ridiculous," he said.
Ted Global is a conference dedicated to "ideas worth spreading". It runs from the 21 to 24 July in Oxford, UK.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/technology/8165928.stm
Published: 2009/07/23 16:28:29 GMT
Wireless power system shown off
By Jonathan Fildes
Technology reporter, BBC News, Oxford
A system that can deliver power to devices without the need for wires has been shown off at a hi-tech conference.
The technique exploits simple physics and can be used to charge a range of electronic devices over many metres.
Eric Giler, chief executive of US firm Witricity, showed mobile phones and televisions charging wirelessly at the TED Global conference in Oxford.
He said the system could replace the miles of expensive power cables and billions of disposable batteries.
"There is something like 40 billion disposable batteries built every year for power that, generally speaking, is used within a few inches or feet of where there is very inexpensive power," he said.
Trillions of dollars, he said, had also been invested building an infrastructure of wires "to get power from where it is created to where it is used."
"We love this stuff [electricity] so much," he said.
Mr Giler showed off a Google G1 phone and an Apple iPhone that could be charged using the system.
Witricity, he said, had managed to pack all the necessary components into the body of the G1 phone, but Apple had made that process slightly harder.
"They don't make it easy at Apple to get inside their phones so we put a little sleeve on the back," he said.
He also showed off a commercially available television using the system.
"Imagine you get one of these things and you want to hang it on the wall," he said. "Think about it, you don't want those ugly cords hanging down."
Good vibrations
The system is based on work by physicist Marin Soljacic at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
It exploits "resonance", whereby energy transfer is markedly more efficient when a certain frequency is applied.
When two objects have the same resonant frequency, they exchange energy strongly without having an effect on other, surrounding objects.
For example, it is resonance that can cause a wine glass to explode when a singer hits exactly the right tone.
But instead of using acoustic resonance, Witricity's approach exploits the resonance of low frequency electromagnetic waves.
HOW WIRELESS POWER WORKS
# 1. Magnetic coil (Antenna A) is housed in a box and can be set in wall or ceiling.
# 2. Antenna A, powered by mains, resonates at a specific frequency.
# 3. Electromagnetic waves transmitted through the air.
# 4. Second magnetic coil (Antenna B) fitted in laptop/TV etc resonates at same frequency as first coil and absorbs energy.
# 5. Energy charges the device.
The system uses two coils - one plugged into the mains and the other embedded or attached to the gadget.
Each coil is carefully engineered with the same resonant frequency. When the main coil is connected to an electricity supply, the magnetic field it produces is resonant with that of with the second coil, allowing "tails" of energy to flow between them.
As each "cycle" of energy arrives at the second coil, a voltage begins to build up that can be used to charge the gadget.
Mr Giler said the main coil could be embedded in the "ceiling, in the floor, or underneath your desktop".
Devices using the system would automatically begin to charge as soon as they were within range, he said.
"You'd never have to worry about plugging these things in again."
Safety concerns
Mr Giler was keen to stress the safety of the equipment during the demonstration.
"There's nothing going on - I'm OK," he said walking around a television running on wireless power.
The system is able to operate safely because the energy is largely transferred through magnetic fields.
"Humans and the vast majority of objects around us are non-magnetic in nature," Professor Soljacic, one of the inventors of the system, told BBC News during a visit to Witricity earlier this year.
It is able to do this by exploiting an effect that occurs in a region known as the "far field", the region seen at a distance of more than one wavelength from the device.
In this field, a transmitter would emit mixture of magnetic and potentially dangerous electric fields.
But, crucially, at a distance of less than one wavelength - the "near field" - it is almost entirely magnetic.
Hence, Witricity uses low frequency electromagnetic waves, whose waves are about 30m (100ft) long. Shorter wavelengths would not work.
'Ridiculous technology'
Witricity is not the first jump on the concept of wireless electricity.
For example, the nineteenth century American inventor Thomas Edison and physicist and engineer Nikola Tesla explored the concept.
"In the very early days of electricity before the electric grid was deployed [they] were very interested in developing a scheme to transmit electricity wirelessly over long distances," explained Professor Soljacic.
"They couldn't imagine dragging this vast infrastructure of metallic wires across every continent."
Tesla even went so far as to build a 29m-high aerial known as Wardenclyffe Tower in New York.
"It ran into some financial troubles and that work was never completed," said Professor Soljacic.
Today, chip-giant Intel has seized on a similar idea to Witricity's, whilst other companies work on highly directional mechanisms of energy transfer, such as lasers.
However, unlike Witricity's work, lasers require an uninterrupted line of sight, and are therefore not good for powering objects around the home.
In contrast, Mr Giler said Witricity's approach could be used for a range of applications from laptops and phones to implanted medical devices and electric cars.
"Imagine driving in the garage and the car charges itself," he said.
He even said he had had interest from a company who proposed to use the system for an "electrically-heated dog bowl".
"You go from the sublime to the ridiculous," he said.
Ted Global is a conference dedicated to "ideas worth spreading". It runs from the 21 to 24 July in Oxford, UK.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/technology/8165928.stm
Published: 2009/07/23 16:28:29 GMT
Monday, July 20, 2009
WHY IS CANADA GOOD AT THIS?
Published: 2009-07-18
Reboot Hill: Where electronics go to die
Atlantic Canada Electronics Stewardship recycled 2,000 tonnes of devices last year
By BILL POWER Business Reporter
THERE SHOULD BE A warning sign at the entrance to the FCM Recycling plant in Elmsdale to alert computer geeks and TV freaks to the horrors they are about to witness.
The electronics recycling operation, which employs about 20 people, is where digital devices of all sizes and descriptions come to die.
It is the end of the line for old telephones, discarded laptop computers, redundant fax machines, out-of-date computers, oversized televisions from the 1980s, clunky-looking VCRs and connecting cables of every description.
Bins and skids loaded with computer mice, modems, motherboards and monitors fill FCM’s warehouse in the East Hants Industrial Park, even though it looks big enough to hold a passenger jet or two.
"This is stock that has accumulated after only a few weeks," director Mitchell Rothstein said Friday during a walkabout.
Electronic devices are the fastest-growing source of waste in North America, he said.
Remember those early big-screen TVs that cost thousands of dollars and were bought after months of careful deliberation? They are carefully reduced to piles of electronic rubble in seconds.
How about those gigantic home computer systems with the monster-sized monitors that were the pride of many households in the days before the Internet? They suffer a fate in the recycling process that would make their former owners cringe.
Off comes the steel case, out comes the motherboard and other digital components containing precious metals. And then the chopping begins.
There seems to be a big storage box for every digital component that ever occupied space in an electronics store. There are also big bins filled with various types of plastics and aluminum all over the plant.
Labels and documentation follow most of the material to Quebec for additional refining, Mr. Rothstein said.
"Nova Scotia consumers pay an environmental handling fee when they purchase an electronic device, and it is our job to make sure the recycling process is handled correctly," he said.
FCM, headquartered in Montreal, opened its Elmsdale plant about a year ago after a rigorous environmental audit and assessment process. Sims Recycling Solutions of Toronto runs a similar facility in Burnside Park in Dartmouth.
When Nova Scotians buy an electronic device, they pay an environmental handling fee based on the size of the product. The fee adds about $30 to the cost of an average-sized TV and about $5 to the cost of a laptop computer.
Some people like to gripe about the extra charge.
"People are less inclined to complain about the fee when they see what it is accomplishing," said Jeff Myrick of the Resource Recovery Fund Board in Truro.
The non-profit Atlantic Canada Electronics Stewardship, administered by the Resource Recovery Fund Board, handles electronics recycling in Nova Scotia.
"The program recycled over 2,000 metric tonnes of unwanted electronic devices last year," Mr. Myrick said.
He said this represents more than 200 tractor-trailer loads of material that would otherwise have gone to provincial landfills.
The government wants to reduce Nova Scotians’ garbage disposal to 300 kilograms per person per year by 2015. Provincial Environment Department statistics show that at the end of last year, the disposal total was 429 kilograms per person, which is about 50 per cent below the national average and a reduction from the previous year’s total of 477 kilograms per person.
Bob Kenney, solid waste resource analyst with the province, said electronics disposal regulations introduced in February 2008 for larger products and then expanded this year to include small devices are designed to extend the responsibility of producers and manufacturers in the life cycle of consumer electronics.
"It’s a type of a program where you tell the industry that if they want to sell in this province, they have to set up a program to have the material collected and recycled," he said.
The manufacturers are best qualified to determine how their products should be recycled, Mr. Kenney said. The program also encourages the electronics industry to design products that can be recycled more easily.
Mr. Kenney said other recycling programs would help in achieving the government’s goal of limiting garbage to 300 kilograms per person per year by 2015.
"To reach this target, we have to consider similar programs for other potential products — such as packaging," he said.
( bpower@herald.ca)
© 2008 The Halifax Herald Limited
Reboot Hill: Where electronics go to die
Atlantic Canada Electronics Stewardship recycled 2,000 tonnes of devices last year
By BILL POWER Business Reporter
THERE SHOULD BE A warning sign at the entrance to the FCM Recycling plant in Elmsdale to alert computer geeks and TV freaks to the horrors they are about to witness.
The electronics recycling operation, which employs about 20 people, is where digital devices of all sizes and descriptions come to die.
It is the end of the line for old telephones, discarded laptop computers, redundant fax machines, out-of-date computers, oversized televisions from the 1980s, clunky-looking VCRs and connecting cables of every description.
Bins and skids loaded with computer mice, modems, motherboards and monitors fill FCM’s warehouse in the East Hants Industrial Park, even though it looks big enough to hold a passenger jet or two.
"This is stock that has accumulated after only a few weeks," director Mitchell Rothstein said Friday during a walkabout.
Electronic devices are the fastest-growing source of waste in North America, he said.
Remember those early big-screen TVs that cost thousands of dollars and were bought after months of careful deliberation? They are carefully reduced to piles of electronic rubble in seconds.
How about those gigantic home computer systems with the monster-sized monitors that were the pride of many households in the days before the Internet? They suffer a fate in the recycling process that would make their former owners cringe.
Off comes the steel case, out comes the motherboard and other digital components containing precious metals. And then the chopping begins.
There seems to be a big storage box for every digital component that ever occupied space in an electronics store. There are also big bins filled with various types of plastics and aluminum all over the plant.
Labels and documentation follow most of the material to Quebec for additional refining, Mr. Rothstein said.
"Nova Scotia consumers pay an environmental handling fee when they purchase an electronic device, and it is our job to make sure the recycling process is handled correctly," he said.
FCM, headquartered in Montreal, opened its Elmsdale plant about a year ago after a rigorous environmental audit and assessment process. Sims Recycling Solutions of Toronto runs a similar facility in Burnside Park in Dartmouth.
When Nova Scotians buy an electronic device, they pay an environmental handling fee based on the size of the product. The fee adds about $30 to the cost of an average-sized TV and about $5 to the cost of a laptop computer.
Some people like to gripe about the extra charge.
"People are less inclined to complain about the fee when they see what it is accomplishing," said Jeff Myrick of the Resource Recovery Fund Board in Truro.
The non-profit Atlantic Canada Electronics Stewardship, administered by the Resource Recovery Fund Board, handles electronics recycling in Nova Scotia.
"The program recycled over 2,000 metric tonnes of unwanted electronic devices last year," Mr. Myrick said.
He said this represents more than 200 tractor-trailer loads of material that would otherwise have gone to provincial landfills.
The government wants to reduce Nova Scotians’ garbage disposal to 300 kilograms per person per year by 2015. Provincial Environment Department statistics show that at the end of last year, the disposal total was 429 kilograms per person, which is about 50 per cent below the national average and a reduction from the previous year’s total of 477 kilograms per person.
Bob Kenney, solid waste resource analyst with the province, said electronics disposal regulations introduced in February 2008 for larger products and then expanded this year to include small devices are designed to extend the responsibility of producers and manufacturers in the life cycle of consumer electronics.
"It’s a type of a program where you tell the industry that if they want to sell in this province, they have to set up a program to have the material collected and recycled," he said.
The manufacturers are best qualified to determine how their products should be recycled, Mr. Kenney said. The program also encourages the electronics industry to design products that can be recycled more easily.
Mr. Kenney said other recycling programs would help in achieving the government’s goal of limiting garbage to 300 kilograms per person per year by 2015.
"To reach this target, we have to consider similar programs for other potential products — such as packaging," he said.
( bpower@herald.ca)
© 2008 The Halifax Herald Limited
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
NORTHWEST PROGRESSIVE INSTITUTE SPEAKS OUT
Please donate and help keep NPI going strong
Monday, July 6, 2009
Is Microsoft Windows to blame for an unnecessarily high amount of e-waste?
One of the unpleasant and infrequently discussed side effects of the worldwide information technology revolution is the enormous amount of electronic waste that has been generated by the collective buy it, use it, and junk it mentality that pervades society, especially American society.
When personal computers were first invented in the 1970s, not that many people owned one. Today, personal computers are ubiquitous, along with smartphones, music players, and an array of other gadgets which are commonly referred to as peripherals. Computers and peripherals are fragile, complex instruments, and they inevitably either break down after they've been used for a while, or they become considered obsolete... even if they still work just fine.
Rapid developments in technology have only bolstered the preexisting notions that serve as the tenets of our throw-away culture. What is considered "state of the art" one day may be seemingly outdated by the next day.
Consequently, e-waste has become a big problem - one that states such as Washington have only begun to address with new recycling laws.
Such laws have been enacted thanks to the tireless work of many environmental organizations who have been trying to keep computers and peripherals (as well as their toxic parts) out of landfills.
Recycling laws are crucial and needed. But the conversation about this issue needs to be about more than merely addressing symptoms (how to dispose of gadgets after they are no longer wanted). We should be thinking and talking about the causes (how gadgets become unwanted in the first place.)
One of the reasons computers and peripherals get junked is because people can't get them to work properly. For example, a printer that won't print is no longer useful. And often it's cheaper to go out and buy a new printer than to exert the energy required to get the printer working again.
Many of the problems that lead to nonworking peripherals are caused by software. Choice of operating system thus becomes very relevant to this problem, because an operating system that doesn't reliably communicate with peripherals could result in discarded gadgets. Let's go back to the printer example.
I have sitting on my desk a nice little HP OfficeJet all-in-one that is several years old. When I bought it, the latest version of Microsoft Windows was Windows XP. To get the HP OfficeJet to print and scan properly, I had to install the included device drivers from the included compact disc. (A driver is a piece of software that allows computer programs to interact with hardware components).
Hewlett-Packard's installation wizard took, as I recall, what seemed like the better part of an hour to finish. I had to wait to plug in the USB cable until I was prompted to, which meant I had to sit there and watch the wizard's slow progress until I was needed. After I had successfully installed the drivers, my printer functioned correctly for a few years, until one day, it suddenly stopped working. I was unable to open the HP control panel or do any scanning from my computer.
Some investigation revealed that an update to Windows XP had caused HP's badly engineered software (which relied on some outdated Windows components to function) to quit working. On top of that, the printer's scan drivers somehow broke down, so I was unable to do any scanning at all from my computer.
I ended up hooking the OfficeJet up to an older desktop computer running Windows 2000, and I managed to figure out how to get Windows to share printers so that I could print to the OfficeJet from my primary machine.
I ended up expending quite a bit of time and energy just getting my printer to work again, when I could have just gone out and bought another inexpensive inkjet to take the OfficeJet's place. But I didn't see a reason to replace the OfficeJet since I knew perfectly well that there was nothing wrong with it.
I doubt that most people would do the same. When a peripheral refuses to work, the easiest solution for non-techies is typically to go and get a replacement. That's not so big of an issue if a product is new... take it back to the store and get an exchange or a refund. But once the thirty day returns period is past, the warranty is expired, and the company is no longer making the model... there's a temptation to just do away with it altogether.
Like many Windows users, my problems with peripherals have not just been limited to printers. At various times, the drivers for my computer dock, keyboard, mouse, and card readers have all malfunctioned, and it has taken extensive troubleshooting to get them working again. I've spent enough time trying to solve driver problems to appreciate how cumbersome Microsoft Windows truly is.
Since I began having trouble with my OfficeJet, Microsoft has released Windows Vista and is now readying the release of Windows 7, Vista's successor. HP, however, has not bothered to release a new driver that would make the OfficeJet fully compatible with any version of Windows beyond XP. HP also does not have a driver that would allow my OfficeJet to be hooked up to a machine running Windows Server 2003 or Windows Server 2008.
So even if I wanted to make it possible to print centrally to the OfficeJet from a server without "printer sharing", I couldn't. Not using Windows.
As a consequence of not being able to print the OfficeJet directly, I had hardly been using it, because having an older desktop on constantly just so a printer can be on standby seemed like a waste of energy.
But recently I started using GNU/Linux, or more specifically, the Debian-derived Ubuntu distribution of GNU/Linux. With Linux, adding peripherals - like my trusty OfficeJet - is a breeze. There's no compact discs to insert, no executables to run, no wizards to go through. That's because there are no device drivers to install. They're already present in the distribution.
When I plugged in my OfficeJet, it was instantaneously recognized, and that was it. There was nothing more for me to do. I could print or even scan immediately using the printer's full capabilities. The open source drivers are so intelligent they can even display notifications from the OfficeJet (like a low ink warning).
For someone used to the trouble of setting up hardware in Windows, this experience was unbelievably cool. Now I no longer chuckle when I see the term plug and play, because with Linux, that phrase really does describe how easy it is.
Not all hardware works with Linux, of course, but there are fewer and fewer exceptions these days. The Linux Foundation maintains a database of supported printers, for example, which is pretty big. Chances are, if you've got old peripherals lying around, Linux will be able to recognize them.
If everyone used Linux, people would likely hang on to their peripherals longer, because printers and gadgets wouldn't be constantly breaking down due to unreliable proprietary software. That, in turn, would result in less e-waste.
The same goes for computers. Upgrading a machine to use the next version of Windows is widely considered to be a pain. It's easier to wipe a hard disk and start over, or, even more commonly, to just buy a new computer which comes with Windows preinstalled. Doing so negates a messy upgrade procedure and the need to buy a CD or DVD in a box. But it also means getting a whole new machine.
If everyone used Linux, far fewer people would feel compelled to go out and buy new computers when a new version is released, because upgrading a Linux distribution isn't difficult. The Update Manager reports that there's a new release available, and a few clicks later, the Linux distribution is busy upgrading itself.
Not long after, the computer restarts itself and comes back up running the new version. That's all there is to it.
The lesson is that great software makes almost any hardware last a lot longer. My OfficeJet is no longer supported by HP, and it won't work properly with Windows. But Linux has given it new life, which means I won't have to replace it for years. And that means less e-waste. What a happy thought.
Monday, July 6, 2009
Is Microsoft Windows to blame for an unnecessarily high amount of e-waste?
One of the unpleasant and infrequently discussed side effects of the worldwide information technology revolution is the enormous amount of electronic waste that has been generated by the collective buy it, use it, and junk it mentality that pervades society, especially American society.
When personal computers were first invented in the 1970s, not that many people owned one. Today, personal computers are ubiquitous, along with smartphones, music players, and an array of other gadgets which are commonly referred to as peripherals. Computers and peripherals are fragile, complex instruments, and they inevitably either break down after they've been used for a while, or they become considered obsolete... even if they still work just fine.
Rapid developments in technology have only bolstered the preexisting notions that serve as the tenets of our throw-away culture. What is considered "state of the art" one day may be seemingly outdated by the next day.
Consequently, e-waste has become a big problem - one that states such as Washington have only begun to address with new recycling laws.
Such laws have been enacted thanks to the tireless work of many environmental organizations who have been trying to keep computers and peripherals (as well as their toxic parts) out of landfills.
Recycling laws are crucial and needed. But the conversation about this issue needs to be about more than merely addressing symptoms (how to dispose of gadgets after they are no longer wanted). We should be thinking and talking about the causes (how gadgets become unwanted in the first place.)
One of the reasons computers and peripherals get junked is because people can't get them to work properly. For example, a printer that won't print is no longer useful. And often it's cheaper to go out and buy a new printer than to exert the energy required to get the printer working again.
Many of the problems that lead to nonworking peripherals are caused by software. Choice of operating system thus becomes very relevant to this problem, because an operating system that doesn't reliably communicate with peripherals could result in discarded gadgets. Let's go back to the printer example.
I have sitting on my desk a nice little HP OfficeJet all-in-one that is several years old. When I bought it, the latest version of Microsoft Windows was Windows XP. To get the HP OfficeJet to print and scan properly, I had to install the included device drivers from the included compact disc. (A driver is a piece of software that allows computer programs to interact with hardware components).
Hewlett-Packard's installation wizard took, as I recall, what seemed like the better part of an hour to finish. I had to wait to plug in the USB cable until I was prompted to, which meant I had to sit there and watch the wizard's slow progress until I was needed. After I had successfully installed the drivers, my printer functioned correctly for a few years, until one day, it suddenly stopped working. I was unable to open the HP control panel or do any scanning from my computer.
Some investigation revealed that an update to Windows XP had caused HP's badly engineered software (which relied on some outdated Windows components to function) to quit working. On top of that, the printer's scan drivers somehow broke down, so I was unable to do any scanning at all from my computer.
I ended up hooking the OfficeJet up to an older desktop computer running Windows 2000, and I managed to figure out how to get Windows to share printers so that I could print to the OfficeJet from my primary machine.
I ended up expending quite a bit of time and energy just getting my printer to work again, when I could have just gone out and bought another inexpensive inkjet to take the OfficeJet's place. But I didn't see a reason to replace the OfficeJet since I knew perfectly well that there was nothing wrong with it.
I doubt that most people would do the same. When a peripheral refuses to work, the easiest solution for non-techies is typically to go and get a replacement. That's not so big of an issue if a product is new... take it back to the store and get an exchange or a refund. But once the thirty day returns period is past, the warranty is expired, and the company is no longer making the model... there's a temptation to just do away with it altogether.
Like many Windows users, my problems with peripherals have not just been limited to printers. At various times, the drivers for my computer dock, keyboard, mouse, and card readers have all malfunctioned, and it has taken extensive troubleshooting to get them working again. I've spent enough time trying to solve driver problems to appreciate how cumbersome Microsoft Windows truly is.
Since I began having trouble with my OfficeJet, Microsoft has released Windows Vista and is now readying the release of Windows 7, Vista's successor. HP, however, has not bothered to release a new driver that would make the OfficeJet fully compatible with any version of Windows beyond XP. HP also does not have a driver that would allow my OfficeJet to be hooked up to a machine running Windows Server 2003 or Windows Server 2008.
So even if I wanted to make it possible to print centrally to the OfficeJet from a server without "printer sharing", I couldn't. Not using Windows.
As a consequence of not being able to print the OfficeJet directly, I had hardly been using it, because having an older desktop on constantly just so a printer can be on standby seemed like a waste of energy.
But recently I started using GNU/Linux, or more specifically, the Debian-derived Ubuntu distribution of GNU/Linux. With Linux, adding peripherals - like my trusty OfficeJet - is a breeze. There's no compact discs to insert, no executables to run, no wizards to go through. That's because there are no device drivers to install. They're already present in the distribution.
When I plugged in my OfficeJet, it was instantaneously recognized, and that was it. There was nothing more for me to do. I could print or even scan immediately using the printer's full capabilities. The open source drivers are so intelligent they can even display notifications from the OfficeJet (like a low ink warning).
For someone used to the trouble of setting up hardware in Windows, this experience was unbelievably cool. Now I no longer chuckle when I see the term plug and play, because with Linux, that phrase really does describe how easy it is.
Not all hardware works with Linux, of course, but there are fewer and fewer exceptions these days. The Linux Foundation maintains a database of supported printers, for example, which is pretty big. Chances are, if you've got old peripherals lying around, Linux will be able to recognize them.
If everyone used Linux, people would likely hang on to their peripherals longer, because printers and gadgets wouldn't be constantly breaking down due to unreliable proprietary software. That, in turn, would result in less e-waste.
The same goes for computers. Upgrading a machine to use the next version of Windows is widely considered to be a pain. It's easier to wipe a hard disk and start over, or, even more commonly, to just buy a new computer which comes with Windows preinstalled. Doing so negates a messy upgrade procedure and the need to buy a CD or DVD in a box. But it also means getting a whole new machine.
If everyone used Linux, far fewer people would feel compelled to go out and buy new computers when a new version is released, because upgrading a Linux distribution isn't difficult. The Update Manager reports that there's a new release available, and a few clicks later, the Linux distribution is busy upgrading itself.
Not long after, the computer restarts itself and comes back up running the new version. That's all there is to it.
The lesson is that great software makes almost any hardware last a lot longer. My OfficeJet is no longer supported by HP, and it won't work properly with Windows. But Linux has given it new life, which means I won't have to replace it for years. And that means less e-waste. What a happy thought.
Monday, July 6, 2009
CIO/IBM ON SUSTAINABLE INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY 2007
http://www.cio.com/article/149651/ABC_An_Introduction_to_Environmentally_Sustainable_IT
TECHWORLD PIECE
exposed in WEEE directive
As UK tech waste ends up in Africa.
Siobhan Chapman, Computerworld UK
19 February 2009
Thousands of computers and other e-waste items in the UK are being packaged into cargo containers and shipped illegally to African countries, a joint investigation by Greenpeace, The Independent and Sky News has revealed.
This is despite regulations prohibiting the trade in e-waste.
In an undercover sting, Greenpeace and Sky took an unfixable TV, fitted it with a tracking device and brought it to Hampshire County Council for recycling. "Instead of being safely dismantled in the UK or Europe, like it should have been, the council's recycling company, BJ Electronics, passed it on as 'second-hand goods' and it was shipped off to Nigeria to be sold or scrapped and dumped," Greenpeace wrote in its blog.
"For the first time we were able to track the e-waste from door to door, exposing the loopholes in recycling programmes that allow illicit profits to be made by the developed world's traders by dumping their obsolete and hazardous electronics abroad instead of properly recycling them."
By law, under the European Union's Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive, e-waste must be dismantled or recycled by specialist contractors because of the toxic content of many electrical devices. The three-year probe found, once dumped in Africa, the computers were stripped of their raw metals by young men and children working on poisoned waste dumps.
Greenpeace said thousands of old electronic goods and components leave Europe bound for Africa and Asia every day, despite regulations. "Some will be repaired and reused, but many are beyond repair, meaning that they will eventually be dumped in places where no facilities exist for safe recycling."
Hampshire County Council has launched an inquiry into its waste sites, but insisted that it worked only with dealers who exported functioning equipment.
Computer Aid International has been gathering signatures on an online petition that protests illegal dumping of e-waste. The petition calls on the government to grant more powers and resources to the Environment Agency, in order for them to effectively police the UK Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive.
The non-profit group said: "Cowboy traders are illegally exporting hazardous and toxic electrical waste (e-waste) out of the UK, fraudulently claiming consignments consist entirely of electrical equipment destined for productive re-use, and then dumping it in developing countries such as Ghana, Nigeria and China."
As UK tech waste ends up in Africa.
Siobhan Chapman, Computerworld UK
19 February 2009
Thousands of computers and other e-waste items in the UK are being packaged into cargo containers and shipped illegally to African countries, a joint investigation by Greenpeace, The Independent and Sky News has revealed.
This is despite regulations prohibiting the trade in e-waste.
In an undercover sting, Greenpeace and Sky took an unfixable TV, fitted it with a tracking device and brought it to Hampshire County Council for recycling. "Instead of being safely dismantled in the UK or Europe, like it should have been, the council's recycling company, BJ Electronics, passed it on as 'second-hand goods' and it was shipped off to Nigeria to be sold or scrapped and dumped," Greenpeace wrote in its blog.
"For the first time we were able to track the e-waste from door to door, exposing the loopholes in recycling programmes that allow illicit profits to be made by the developed world's traders by dumping their obsolete and hazardous electronics abroad instead of properly recycling them."
By law, under the European Union's Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive, e-waste must be dismantled or recycled by specialist contractors because of the toxic content of many electrical devices. The three-year probe found, once dumped in Africa, the computers were stripped of their raw metals by young men and children working on poisoned waste dumps.
Greenpeace said thousands of old electronic goods and components leave Europe bound for Africa and Asia every day, despite regulations. "Some will be repaired and reused, but many are beyond repair, meaning that they will eventually be dumped in places where no facilities exist for safe recycling."
Hampshire County Council has launched an inquiry into its waste sites, but insisted that it worked only with dealers who exported functioning equipment.
Computer Aid International has been gathering signatures on an online petition that protests illegal dumping of e-waste. The petition calls on the government to grant more powers and resources to the Environment Agency, in order for them to effectively police the UK Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive.
The non-profit group said: "Cowboy traders are illegally exporting hazardous and toxic electrical waste (e-waste) out of the UK, fraudulently claiming consignments consist entirely of electrical equipment destined for productive re-use, and then dumping it in developing countries such as Ghana, Nigeria and China."
YOURS FOR 495 DOLLARS
Gartner Says Emerging Markets Could Become Dumping Grounds for Secondary PCs
By 2012, Emerging Countries Will Need to Dispose of 30 Million Secondary PCs Annually
STAMFORD, Conn., June 24, 2009 — Demand for secondary PCs will outstrip supply for years to come, but reuse does not necessarily mean "greener" IT because growing exports for reuse or recycling are leading to increasing e-waste in emerging markets, according to Gartner, Inc.
"Although reuse must be considered preferable to most other forms of waste management, without effective controls, exports for reuse can be an excuse for dumping, and even in the best case result in 'passing the toxic buck' to emerging economies, which are seldom equipped to deal with this problem in an environmentally and socially responsible way," said Meike Escherich, principal research analyst at Gartner.
In 2008, 37 million secondary PCs were refurbished and exported to emerging markets, and Gartner predicts that this number will rise to 69 million by 2012. A secondary PC is one that is repurposed after its primary use (as a new PC) has ended. Secondary PCs must have been used in the installed base for more than 120 days to be considered secondary use.
Gartner found that the demand for secondary PCs has increased as the global recession has tightened its grip. As product life cycles lengthen, demand for secondhand PCs is outstripping supply. Even when the markets recover, shortages of used PCs will continue as large volumes, especially of notebooks, will be too old to have a useful second life span.
These secondary PCs will eventually need to be disposed of. In 2007, nearly 68 million secondary PCs had to be discarded worldwide. In emerging countries, approximately 15 million secondary PCs had to be discarded in 2007. Gartner estimates that by 2012, emerging countries will need to dispose of a total of 30 million secondary PCs annually.
"Without action, OEMs will find that an increasing number of their PCs will either end up in landfills or find their way into illegal or badly set up private 'workshops' for dismantling," Ms. Escherich said. "Neither will be advantageous for a vendor's 'green' credentials."
A thriving international trade has emerged for used PCs, largely from mature to developing countries. Exporting brings important benefits, contributing significantly to the operations of schools, small businesses and government agencies. Furthermore, extending the life cycle of PCs prevents substantial environmental damage. Gartner believes that the manufacturing phase accounts for up to 70 percent of the natural resources used in the life cycle of a computer, and extending the lifetime via second use provides an important environmental service.
Although some exported used PCs are handled responsibly in demand countries with effective regulatory regimes and by companies with advanced technologies, many end up in developing countries where they are frequently handled and disposed of unsafely. Emerging economies often lack the capacity to safely handle and dispose of used PCs, and extremely low labor costs and lack of environmental controls make unsafe recycling commonplace.
"Although repair and reuse are worthy goals, without efficient enforcement of worldwide legislation and controls, they are simply loopholes allowing for 'greenwash,'" said Charles Smulders, managing vice president at Gartner. "The fact remains that every single one of these PCs must be disposed of sometime, somewhere and somehow."
Until a universal enforcement mechanism is developed and effectively implemented, consumers and businesses aiming to be environmentally responsible with their used PCs should be skeptical of companies that claim to responsibly recycle these devices.
Ms. Escherich advised PC vendors to seriously consider adopting the same standards globally that they are legally bound to adhere to in stringently regulated regions, such as Europe and Japan. "After all, nothing exposes 'greenwash' more dramatically than an A-branded PC found dumped in a developing country in Asia or Africa," she said.
Additional information is available in the Gartner report "Dataquest Insight: Emerging Markets Are Becoming Dumping Grounds for Secondary PCs." The report is available on Gartner's Web site at http://www.gartner.com/DisplayDocument?ref=g_search&id=990315&subref=simplesearch.
By 2012, Emerging Countries Will Need to Dispose of 30 Million Secondary PCs Annually
STAMFORD, Conn., June 24, 2009 — Demand for secondary PCs will outstrip supply for years to come, but reuse does not necessarily mean "greener" IT because growing exports for reuse or recycling are leading to increasing e-waste in emerging markets, according to Gartner, Inc.
"Although reuse must be considered preferable to most other forms of waste management, without effective controls, exports for reuse can be an excuse for dumping, and even in the best case result in 'passing the toxic buck' to emerging economies, which are seldom equipped to deal with this problem in an environmentally and socially responsible way," said Meike Escherich, principal research analyst at Gartner.
In 2008, 37 million secondary PCs were refurbished and exported to emerging markets, and Gartner predicts that this number will rise to 69 million by 2012. A secondary PC is one that is repurposed after its primary use (as a new PC) has ended. Secondary PCs must have been used in the installed base for more than 120 days to be considered secondary use.
Gartner found that the demand for secondary PCs has increased as the global recession has tightened its grip. As product life cycles lengthen, demand for secondhand PCs is outstripping supply. Even when the markets recover, shortages of used PCs will continue as large volumes, especially of notebooks, will be too old to have a useful second life span.
These secondary PCs will eventually need to be disposed of. In 2007, nearly 68 million secondary PCs had to be discarded worldwide. In emerging countries, approximately 15 million secondary PCs had to be discarded in 2007. Gartner estimates that by 2012, emerging countries will need to dispose of a total of 30 million secondary PCs annually.
"Without action, OEMs will find that an increasing number of their PCs will either end up in landfills or find their way into illegal or badly set up private 'workshops' for dismantling," Ms. Escherich said. "Neither will be advantageous for a vendor's 'green' credentials."
A thriving international trade has emerged for used PCs, largely from mature to developing countries. Exporting brings important benefits, contributing significantly to the operations of schools, small businesses and government agencies. Furthermore, extending the life cycle of PCs prevents substantial environmental damage. Gartner believes that the manufacturing phase accounts for up to 70 percent of the natural resources used in the life cycle of a computer, and extending the lifetime via second use provides an important environmental service.
Although some exported used PCs are handled responsibly in demand countries with effective regulatory regimes and by companies with advanced technologies, many end up in developing countries where they are frequently handled and disposed of unsafely. Emerging economies often lack the capacity to safely handle and dispose of used PCs, and extremely low labor costs and lack of environmental controls make unsafe recycling commonplace.
"Although repair and reuse are worthy goals, without efficient enforcement of worldwide legislation and controls, they are simply loopholes allowing for 'greenwash,'" said Charles Smulders, managing vice president at Gartner. "The fact remains that every single one of these PCs must be disposed of sometime, somewhere and somehow."
Until a universal enforcement mechanism is developed and effectively implemented, consumers and businesses aiming to be environmentally responsible with their used PCs should be skeptical of companies that claim to responsibly recycle these devices.
Ms. Escherich advised PC vendors to seriously consider adopting the same standards globally that they are legally bound to adhere to in stringently regulated regions, such as Europe and Japan. "After all, nothing exposes 'greenwash' more dramatically than an A-branded PC found dumped in a developing country in Asia or Africa," she said.
Additional information is available in the Gartner report "Dataquest Insight: Emerging Markets Are Becoming Dumping Grounds for Secondary PCs." The report is available on Gartner's Web site at http://www.gartner.com/DisplayDocument?ref=g_search&id=990315&subref=simplesearch.
grauniad and digital radio
Is there a digital radio that's more energy efficient than my old analogue radio?
Yes, but only if you don't mind winding up the radio every three minutes, says Leo Hickman
* Leo Hickman
*
o guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 3 June 2009 15.53 BST
A digital radio and breakfast
Digital radios use a great deal more energy than analogue ones. Photograph: David Sillitoe/Guardian
Is there a digital radio that's more energy efficient than my old analogue radio?
P Langley, by email
It's not long to wait now until the government announces the switchover date that will see FM radio frequencies turned off leaving only DAB digital radio signals for us to enjoy Westwood, Wossy, Wogan and all the other delights Marconi could only have dreamed of. Lord Carter, the communications minister, is expected to set the date on June 16 when he releases the final Digital Britain report.
As with the on-going switchover from analogue to digital TV, there are already grumbles that such a move will mean many of us are forced to go out and buy yet another piece of expensive gadgetry for our homes – a decent DAB radio can easily set you back £50 or more — when our existing equipment seemingly performs a more than an adequate job. It saddens me, for example, that a small battery-powered transistor radio that's been the perfect bathroom companion for the past 20 years or so will soon be made redundant when it could presumably go on delivering the Today programme both today and for many more tomorrows.
What's equally annoying, however, is that I will, in all likelihood, have to replace my beloved radio with one that consumes more energy. It's all in the name of progress, apparently, as we will now be saved from "suffering" any more snap, crackle and pop when we're listen to the radio. Clearer reception may be the result for some listeners, but, according to an Energy Saving Trust report (pdf) published two years ago, "traditional analogue radios have an average on-power consumption of two watts, but digital radios consume, on average, more than four times this amount (8.5 watts)." Radios – be they analogue or digital – rank fairly low down the list of the most energy hungry appliances in our home, but it does seems slightly at odds with our energy-saving mantra that we should be making a step-change towards a technology that uses "more than four times" the power of its predecessor.
Worse, perhaps, is that they typically make use of standby power. Many of the DAB radio manufacturers are making an effort to produce more energy efficient products. For example, Pure — the self-proclaimed " world's leading DAB digital radio manufacturer" — has recently announced the launch of its "Less than a Light Bulb" campaign to highlight that fact that four of its radios carrying the EST's "Energy Saving Recommended" label running at the same time will still use less energy than a low-energy lightbulb. To earn such a label, a radio must consume less than 3.5W of electricity. This is a welcome development, but it still doesn't beat the energy consumption of the average analogue radio.
Wind-up and solar-powered DAB radios offer an extra alternative, but I doubt these will supply the bulk of the demand expected to be created by the switchover. Plus when you consider one minute of winding the first ever wind-up DAB model provides just three minutes of digital radio versus an hour of FM, it's also likely most wind-up DABs will frequently be charged from the mains.
Yes, but only if you don't mind winding up the radio every three minutes, says Leo Hickman
* Leo Hickman
*
o guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 3 June 2009 15.53 BST
A digital radio and breakfast
Digital radios use a great deal more energy than analogue ones. Photograph: David Sillitoe/Guardian
Is there a digital radio that's more energy efficient than my old analogue radio?
P Langley, by email
It's not long to wait now until the government announces the switchover date that will see FM radio frequencies turned off leaving only DAB digital radio signals for us to enjoy Westwood, Wossy, Wogan and all the other delights Marconi could only have dreamed of. Lord Carter, the communications minister, is expected to set the date on June 16 when he releases the final Digital Britain report.
As with the on-going switchover from analogue to digital TV, there are already grumbles that such a move will mean many of us are forced to go out and buy yet another piece of expensive gadgetry for our homes – a decent DAB radio can easily set you back £50 or more — when our existing equipment seemingly performs a more than an adequate job. It saddens me, for example, that a small battery-powered transistor radio that's been the perfect bathroom companion for the past 20 years or so will soon be made redundant when it could presumably go on delivering the Today programme both today and for many more tomorrows.
What's equally annoying, however, is that I will, in all likelihood, have to replace my beloved radio with one that consumes more energy. It's all in the name of progress, apparently, as we will now be saved from "suffering" any more snap, crackle and pop when we're listen to the radio. Clearer reception may be the result for some listeners, but, according to an Energy Saving Trust report (pdf) published two years ago, "traditional analogue radios have an average on-power consumption of two watts, but digital radios consume, on average, more than four times this amount (8.5 watts)." Radios – be they analogue or digital – rank fairly low down the list of the most energy hungry appliances in our home, but it does seems slightly at odds with our energy-saving mantra that we should be making a step-change towards a technology that uses "more than four times" the power of its predecessor.
Worse, perhaps, is that they typically make use of standby power. Many of the DAB radio manufacturers are making an effort to produce more energy efficient products. For example, Pure — the self-proclaimed " world's leading DAB digital radio manufacturer" — has recently announced the launch of its "Less than a Light Bulb" campaign to highlight that fact that four of its radios carrying the EST's "Energy Saving Recommended" label running at the same time will still use less energy than a low-energy lightbulb. To earn such a label, a radio must consume less than 3.5W of electricity. This is a welcome development, but it still doesn't beat the energy consumption of the average analogue radio.
Wind-up and solar-powered DAB radios offer an extra alternative, but I doubt these will supply the bulk of the demand expected to be created by the switchover. Plus when you consider one minute of winding the first ever wind-up DAB model provides just three minutes of digital radio versus an hour of FM, it's also likely most wind-up DABs will frequently be charged from the mains.
EVEN BLOODY TORIES GET IT, says the guardian
* John Plunkett
Jeremy Hunt
Jeremy Hunt: 'To be director general of the BBC is a privilege, just like it is to be an MP – and I don't think we do it for the money.' Photograph: David Levene
The BBC director general, Mark Thompson, is paid too much money and needs a "reality check", the shadow culture secretary, Jeremy Hunt, said today.
Hunt, speaking at the Radio Festival in Nottingham today, was also sceptical about government plans for a 2015 analogue radio switchoff date, saying it risked coming too soon and angering listeners and voters.
The Conservative culture spokesman added that Thompson's total remuneration package – £816,000 last year – was a "huge amount of money".
"I think to be director general of the BBC is a privilege, just like it is a privilege to be a member of parliament and I don't think we do it for the money," Hunt said.
"We have got into a ratchet effect with public sector salaries benchmarked against the private sector. I think £816,000 is too much for the director general of the BBC. It is a huge amount of money and one of the areas where we need to have a reality check."
Hunt told radio executives in Nottingham that a future Conservative government would be "wholeheartedly behind the digital switchover of the radio industry", while questioning whether the 2015 date set by Lord Carter's Digital Britain report last month was achievable.
"I think 2015 is unrealistic unless we do more between now and 2015 than is currently planned. I would find it difficult to recommend to prime minister Cameron as things stand now that there should be switchoff in 2015," Hunt said.
But he added that Digital Britain did not address the inadequacies of digital audio broadcasting - DAB - coverage, or who was going to pay to improve it. And he said while progress was being made to develop in-car digital radio, not enough was being done.
The prospect of millions of analogue radio sets becoming redundant would be "incredibly unpopular" among listeners and "very environmentally unfriendly", he added.
"We don't want to switch off a lot of listeners at precisely the time the radio industry needs every listener it can get," he said.
"We need to think about the listener, the consumer, and ask whether we are really going to say that 120m radio sets will become redundant in 2015, or whether we want to have a smoother migration path in the way we had the migration from tape, to CD, to the iPod.
"If the market hasn't got to the place where it needs to be by 2015, should Ofcom be given the power to extend that deadline? So we have switchover but we don't necessarily have switchoff in 2015.
"We need to find things that make digital radio and DAB radio a lot more exciting to consumers than it current is. At the moment, people feel there is a small improvement in quality but apart from that the benefits are small. In fact, for many people they question whether there are benefits at all.
"We have to work together to make this happen. There is a lot that has to happen to make sure we don't end up with angry consumers and angry listeners."
He mooted the possibility of a swap scheme where people could exchange their analogue radios for digital audio broadcasting (DAB) radios for free as one way of encouraging further digital radio takeup.
•
Jeremy Hunt
Jeremy Hunt: 'To be director general of the BBC is a privilege, just like it is to be an MP – and I don't think we do it for the money.' Photograph: David Levene
The BBC director general, Mark Thompson, is paid too much money and needs a "reality check", the shadow culture secretary, Jeremy Hunt, said today.
Hunt, speaking at the Radio Festival in Nottingham today, was also sceptical about government plans for a 2015 analogue radio switchoff date, saying it risked coming too soon and angering listeners and voters.
The Conservative culture spokesman added that Thompson's total remuneration package – £816,000 last year – was a "huge amount of money".
"I think to be director general of the BBC is a privilege, just like it is a privilege to be a member of parliament and I don't think we do it for the money," Hunt said.
"We have got into a ratchet effect with public sector salaries benchmarked against the private sector. I think £816,000 is too much for the director general of the BBC. It is a huge amount of money and one of the areas where we need to have a reality check."
Hunt told radio executives in Nottingham that a future Conservative government would be "wholeheartedly behind the digital switchover of the radio industry", while questioning whether the 2015 date set by Lord Carter's Digital Britain report last month was achievable.
"I think 2015 is unrealistic unless we do more between now and 2015 than is currently planned. I would find it difficult to recommend to prime minister Cameron as things stand now that there should be switchoff in 2015," Hunt said.
But he added that Digital Britain did not address the inadequacies of digital audio broadcasting - DAB - coverage, or who was going to pay to improve it. And he said while progress was being made to develop in-car digital radio, not enough was being done.
The prospect of millions of analogue radio sets becoming redundant would be "incredibly unpopular" among listeners and "very environmentally unfriendly", he added.
"We don't want to switch off a lot of listeners at precisely the time the radio industry needs every listener it can get," he said.
"We need to think about the listener, the consumer, and ask whether we are really going to say that 120m radio sets will become redundant in 2015, or whether we want to have a smoother migration path in the way we had the migration from tape, to CD, to the iPod.
"If the market hasn't got to the place where it needs to be by 2015, should Ofcom be given the power to extend that deadline? So we have switchover but we don't necessarily have switchoff in 2015.
"We need to find things that make digital radio and DAB radio a lot more exciting to consumers than it current is. At the moment, people feel there is a small improvement in quality but apart from that the benefits are small. In fact, for many people they question whether there are benefits at all.
"We have to work together to make this happen. There is a lot that has to happen to make sure we don't end up with angry consumers and angry listeners."
He mooted the possibility of a swap scheme where people could exchange their analogue radios for digital audio broadcasting (DAB) radios for free as one way of encouraging further digital radio takeup.
•
MARK MEISNER HAS THIS NEW BLOG
"Indications: Environmental Communication & Culture" over at http://indications.wordpress.com/
DES MOINES REGISTER ON FAT-SCREEN TVs
June 22, 2009
Digital switch spurs increase in TV recycling
By DANNY VALENTINE
dvalentine@dmreg.com
Susan Powers of Nichols owns seven TVs. Not one of them works.
That's what happens when you have eight kids and a big farmhouse, she said.
Some have been broken for a while, some are black and white, and most are smaller than 30 inches. She said that since the digital transition on June 12, all are likely headed for the recycle bin.
Powers is one of many Iowans who are responding to recent Iowa Department of Natural Resources pleas to recycle unwanted or obsolete TVs rather than tossing the sets, which contain high amounts of lead and poisonous heavy metals.
"I thought I would empty a room," Powers said.
Susan Johnson, an environmental specialist with the DNR, said last week she has been so inundated with calls over the past couple weeks about how to recycle TVs that she has temporarily dropped her other responsibilities.
She estimates she has received about 200 calls since the department's newspaper and radio campaign on electronic waste began June 1.
There are more than 100 electronic waste permitted facilities across the state, ranging from city landfills to private enterprise. Eventually, much of this electronic waste is funneled into the four DNR-approved processing centers.
Midwest Recovery in Bondurant, which is one of the DNR's four centers, reported a 50 percent increase in television recycling this year and has already matched 2008's total. Another of the electronic processing centers, the Waste Commission of Scott County, reported a 30 percent increase in the number of TVs recycled, while the other two, Midwest Electronic Recovery of Walford and Phoenix E-Waste Solutions in Marshalltown, have also had increases.
Televisions pose a massive environmental threat if not properly recycled, experts say.
Sets can contain as much as seven to 10 pounds of lead in addition to other poisonous heavy metals that can leach into landfills. Electronic waste made up 40 percent of the lead and 75 percent of the heavy metals found in landfills, according to the DNR.
Some electronic recyclers doubt television recycling is up solely because of the digital transition, but say that now is a good time to upgrade to a higher-quality, lighter and affordable television set.
"If I had to guess, it was a great way for a lot of guys to get their flat screen," said Dave Long, president of Midwest Electronic Recovery.
Since Dec. 22, the Waste Commission of Scott County, which handles some electronic waste from the Metro Waste Authority in Des Moines, reported receiving 5,513 televisions, representing 242,322 pounds, said Erin Robinson, a spokeswoman for the organization.
That's about a 30 percent increase in the pounds of TVs taken to the recyclers from the previous three years. This year, TVs make up about 56 percent of all electronic waste.
"I think a lot of people who were waiting bit the bullet and actually did go out and purchase a new TV," said Kathy Morris, the director of the Waste Commission of Scott County.
Additional Facts
Where to recycle a television
Go to www.iowadnr.gov/waste/recycling/tvrecycling.html for a list of options.
Digital switch spurs increase in TV recycling
By DANNY VALENTINE
dvalentine@dmreg.com
Susan Powers of Nichols owns seven TVs. Not one of them works.
That's what happens when you have eight kids and a big farmhouse, she said.
Some have been broken for a while, some are black and white, and most are smaller than 30 inches. She said that since the digital transition on June 12, all are likely headed for the recycle bin.
Powers is one of many Iowans who are responding to recent Iowa Department of Natural Resources pleas to recycle unwanted or obsolete TVs rather than tossing the sets, which contain high amounts of lead and poisonous heavy metals.
"I thought I would empty a room," Powers said.
Susan Johnson, an environmental specialist with the DNR, said last week she has been so inundated with calls over the past couple weeks about how to recycle TVs that she has temporarily dropped her other responsibilities.
She estimates she has received about 200 calls since the department's newspaper and radio campaign on electronic waste began June 1.
There are more than 100 electronic waste permitted facilities across the state, ranging from city landfills to private enterprise. Eventually, much of this electronic waste is funneled into the four DNR-approved processing centers.
Midwest Recovery in Bondurant, which is one of the DNR's four centers, reported a 50 percent increase in television recycling this year and has already matched 2008's total. Another of the electronic processing centers, the Waste Commission of Scott County, reported a 30 percent increase in the number of TVs recycled, while the other two, Midwest Electronic Recovery of Walford and Phoenix E-Waste Solutions in Marshalltown, have also had increases.
Televisions pose a massive environmental threat if not properly recycled, experts say.
Sets can contain as much as seven to 10 pounds of lead in addition to other poisonous heavy metals that can leach into landfills. Electronic waste made up 40 percent of the lead and 75 percent of the heavy metals found in landfills, according to the DNR.
Some electronic recyclers doubt television recycling is up solely because of the digital transition, but say that now is a good time to upgrade to a higher-quality, lighter and affordable television set.
"If I had to guess, it was a great way for a lot of guys to get their flat screen," said Dave Long, president of Midwest Electronic Recovery.
Since Dec. 22, the Waste Commission of Scott County, which handles some electronic waste from the Metro Waste Authority in Des Moines, reported receiving 5,513 televisions, representing 242,322 pounds, said Erin Robinson, a spokeswoman for the organization.
That's about a 30 percent increase in the pounds of TVs taken to the recyclers from the previous three years. This year, TVs make up about 56 percent of all electronic waste.
"I think a lot of people who were waiting bit the bullet and actually did go out and purchase a new TV," said Kathy Morris, the director of the Waste Commission of Scott County.
Additional Facts
Where to recycle a television
Go to www.iowadnr.gov/waste/recycling/tvrecycling.html for a list of options.
tanner higin sent me this great video link re ghana
http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/stories/ghana804/video/video_index.html
Saturday, July 4, 2009
BBC LIFTS ITS GAME
Mixed results for green IT goals
A majority of public sector employees do not know about environmentally friendly IT targets set out in government's Greening ICT Strategy.
The strategy calls for government IT to be carbon neutral by 2012, with office carbon emissions down 11.5% by 2011.
One of the commissioners of the report says there are scattered trends toward compliance with the strategy.
However, a survey of IT managers in the public sector showed 60% did not know there were any targets to aim for.
The report, titled "The Path to Green Government", was produced by environmental charity Global Action Plan and commissioned by networking giant Cisco.
It is estimated that information and communication technology (ICT) accounts for one-fifth of the Government's carbon emissions. The Greening ICT Strategy was intended to put the government in a leadership role in the sustainable use of ICT.
A large proportion of carbon emissions can be blamed on the manufacture of new equipment, so a principal focus of the initiative is to make the best use of existing equipment.
However, there is more to the plan once procurement is slimmed down, according to Cisco's head of public sector Neil Crockett.
"There is another, much bigger debate about how ICT can enable other things to happen, like building management, travel reduction, flexible working," he said.
'Pockets of excellence'
The Global Action Plan study was conducted by direct surveys of ICT managers in the public sector - local and national government, education, healthcare and so on - as well as a questionnaire in the magazine Computer Weekly.
Some 60% of respondents said that they were unaware of the Greening ICT Strategy, and among those who were aware, nearly one-third said that they had made no changes to their own ICT usage and procurement, and had no plans to make any such changes.
The problem, according to Global Action Plan director Trewin Restorick, is poor collaboration and knowledge sharing across the sector.
“ government electricity usage is continuing to rise, and it is likely that one of the big reasons for this is the proliferation of computers, laptops, chargers, lobby televisions and the air conditioning of server rooms ”
Rebecca Willis, Sustainable Development Commission
"What we saw was pockets of excellence, areas where the public sector is making both cash savings and carbon savings through smarter use of ICT," he told BBC News.
"But what we discovered was that those pockets of activity tended not to be part of a wider strategy within the public sector. They were very much piecemeal initiatives, which suggests they were being driven by keen individuals."
One straightforward route to knowledge sharing is that between IT managers and those who pay for the energy that the equipment consumes; more than two-thirds of respondents said that they were neither responsible for paying for the energy, nor did they see the bill.
Less than half had calculated their department's "carbon footprint".
"For an ICT manager, if they're not paying the energy bills - which are both volatile and going up - they have no interest in knowing what the long term impact of the product is," he said. "So you get managers buying stuff without thinking about utilising the assets they've got."
While the longer term goal to ameliorate the effects of climate change are a driving force for compliancy, in 2010 the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs' Carbon Reduction Commitment scheme will come into effect.
Under the scheme, each large private sector business and public sector organisation will tally up its carbon emissions, with a price tag of 12 pounds per tonne of emissions. Organisation will be placed into league tables; depending on where they fit, they will or will not get the money back.
The concern is that public sector money can, if the sector performs badly, be siphoned off into the private sector - a loss both in monetary and in ideological terms.
"'Health service money goes to Tesco's' is not a great headline," said Mr Restorick.
Groundswell
Catalina McGregor, government deputy champion of the Cabinet Office's CIO/CTO Council Green ICT Delivery Group, said a report from her office due for release in late August will comprehensively detail how each department is doing in unprecedented detail, from intelligence departments all the way to museums.
While its results are mixed, she told BBC News that signs of progress were widespread and that Mr Restorick's assessment may be a bit wide of the mark.
"I'm a little gun-shy to say that folk aren't working well together, because they are," she said. "It's very rare that something central is taken up by local [offices] to this extent on a voluntary basis. It's true that there are no 'big sticks', no incentives, no budgets; but there is a groundswell of support for the green ICT programme."
Rebecca Willis, vice chair of the government's green watchdog the Sustainable Development Commission, pointed out that despite commitments from government, signs of overall change were still lacking.
"The Greening ICT Strategy is an encouraging step towards making government IT more sustainable," she told BBC News.
"However, government electricity usage is continuing to rise, and it is likely that one of the big reasons for this is the proliferation of computers, laptops, chargers, lobby televisions and the air conditioning of server rooms. It's clear that ambition levels need to be raised."
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/technology/8131566.stm
Published: 2009/07/03 07:54:03 GMT
A majority of public sector employees do not know about environmentally friendly IT targets set out in government's Greening ICT Strategy.
The strategy calls for government IT to be carbon neutral by 2012, with office carbon emissions down 11.5% by 2011.
One of the commissioners of the report says there are scattered trends toward compliance with the strategy.
However, a survey of IT managers in the public sector showed 60% did not know there were any targets to aim for.
The report, titled "The Path to Green Government", was produced by environmental charity Global Action Plan and commissioned by networking giant Cisco.
It is estimated that information and communication technology (ICT) accounts for one-fifth of the Government's carbon emissions. The Greening ICT Strategy was intended to put the government in a leadership role in the sustainable use of ICT.
A large proportion of carbon emissions can be blamed on the manufacture of new equipment, so a principal focus of the initiative is to make the best use of existing equipment.
However, there is more to the plan once procurement is slimmed down, according to Cisco's head of public sector Neil Crockett.
"There is another, much bigger debate about how ICT can enable other things to happen, like building management, travel reduction, flexible working," he said.
'Pockets of excellence'
The Global Action Plan study was conducted by direct surveys of ICT managers in the public sector - local and national government, education, healthcare and so on - as well as a questionnaire in the magazine Computer Weekly.
Some 60% of respondents said that they were unaware of the Greening ICT Strategy, and among those who were aware, nearly one-third said that they had made no changes to their own ICT usage and procurement, and had no plans to make any such changes.
The problem, according to Global Action Plan director Trewin Restorick, is poor collaboration and knowledge sharing across the sector.
“ government electricity usage is continuing to rise, and it is likely that one of the big reasons for this is the proliferation of computers, laptops, chargers, lobby televisions and the air conditioning of server rooms ”
Rebecca Willis, Sustainable Development Commission
"What we saw was pockets of excellence, areas where the public sector is making both cash savings and carbon savings through smarter use of ICT," he told BBC News.
"But what we discovered was that those pockets of activity tended not to be part of a wider strategy within the public sector. They were very much piecemeal initiatives, which suggests they were being driven by keen individuals."
One straightforward route to knowledge sharing is that between IT managers and those who pay for the energy that the equipment consumes; more than two-thirds of respondents said that they were neither responsible for paying for the energy, nor did they see the bill.
Less than half had calculated their department's "carbon footprint".
"For an ICT manager, if they're not paying the energy bills - which are both volatile and going up - they have no interest in knowing what the long term impact of the product is," he said. "So you get managers buying stuff without thinking about utilising the assets they've got."
While the longer term goal to ameliorate the effects of climate change are a driving force for compliancy, in 2010 the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs' Carbon Reduction Commitment scheme will come into effect.
Under the scheme, each large private sector business and public sector organisation will tally up its carbon emissions, with a price tag of 12 pounds per tonne of emissions. Organisation will be placed into league tables; depending on where they fit, they will or will not get the money back.
The concern is that public sector money can, if the sector performs badly, be siphoned off into the private sector - a loss both in monetary and in ideological terms.
"'Health service money goes to Tesco's' is not a great headline," said Mr Restorick.
Groundswell
Catalina McGregor, government deputy champion of the Cabinet Office's CIO/CTO Council Green ICT Delivery Group, said a report from her office due for release in late August will comprehensively detail how each department is doing in unprecedented detail, from intelligence departments all the way to museums.
While its results are mixed, she told BBC News that signs of progress were widespread and that Mr Restorick's assessment may be a bit wide of the mark.
"I'm a little gun-shy to say that folk aren't working well together, because they are," she said. "It's very rare that something central is taken up by local [offices] to this extent on a voluntary basis. It's true that there are no 'big sticks', no incentives, no budgets; but there is a groundswell of support for the green ICT programme."
Rebecca Willis, vice chair of the government's green watchdog the Sustainable Development Commission, pointed out that despite commitments from government, signs of overall change were still lacking.
"The Greening ICT Strategy is an encouraging step towards making government IT more sustainable," she told BBC News.
"However, government electricity usage is continuing to rise, and it is likely that one of the big reasons for this is the proliferation of computers, laptops, chargers, lobby televisions and the air conditioning of server rooms. It's clear that ambition levels need to be raised."
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/technology/8131566.stm
Published: 2009/07/03 07:54:03 GMT
Thursday, July 2, 2009
RICK MAXWELL KINDLY SENT THIS
Story:
Illnesses come to light in claims against Disney
Residents cite cancer, diseases in animals as proof of chromium 6 contamination.
BURBANK — As their attorneys shuffle between four similar lawsuits that allege the Walt Disney Co. has for decades contaminated groundwater with cancer-causing chromium 6 and other toxic chemicals, stories of ill health from the plaintiffs are beginning to emerge.
In the latest lawsuit, filed last week in Los Angeles Superior Court by the Sacramento-based firm Kershaw Cutter & Ratinoff LLP on behalf of 16 people with strong ties to the Rancho District, the plaintiffs claim Disney dumped wastewater contaminated with hexavalent chromium from its on-site cooling systems down the centerline of Parkside Avenue, toward Parish Place and across Riverside Drive into the so-called Polliwog, an 11-acre parcel near the studio's Imagineering facilities.
For more of this story, click on or type the URL below:
http://www.glendalenewspress.com/articles/2009/06/16/publicsafety/gnp-polliwog16.txt
Illnesses come to light in claims against Disney
Residents cite cancer, diseases in animals as proof of chromium 6 contamination.
BURBANK — As their attorneys shuffle between four similar lawsuits that allege the Walt Disney Co. has for decades contaminated groundwater with cancer-causing chromium 6 and other toxic chemicals, stories of ill health from the plaintiffs are beginning to emerge.
In the latest lawsuit, filed last week in Los Angeles Superior Court by the Sacramento-based firm Kershaw Cutter & Ratinoff LLP on behalf of 16 people with strong ties to the Rancho District, the plaintiffs claim Disney dumped wastewater contaminated with hexavalent chromium from its on-site cooling systems down the centerline of Parkside Avenue, toward Parish Place and across Riverside Drive into the so-called Polliwog, an 11-acre parcel near the studio's Imagineering facilities.
For more of this story, click on or type the URL below:
http://www.glendalenewspress.com/articles/2009/06/16/publicsafety/gnp-polliwog16.txt
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
BRANDON WOOLF KINDLY SENT ALONG THIS NEW YORK TIMES STORY
June 30, 2009
A Green Way to Dump Low-Tech Electronics
By LESLIE KAUFMAN
This month, Edward Reilly, 35, finally let go of the television he had owned since his college days.
Although the Mitsubishi set was technologically outdated, it had sat for years in Mr. Reilly’s home in Portland, Me., because he did not know what else to do with it, given the environmental hazards involved in discarding it.
“It’s pretty well known that if it gets into the landfill, it gets into the groundwater,” he said. “Its chemicals pollute.”
But the day after the nationwide conversion to digital television signals took effect on June 12, Mr. Reilly decided to take advantage of a new wave of laws in Maine and elsewhere that require television and computer manufacturers to recycle their products free of charge. He dropped off his television at an electronic waste collection site near his home and, he said, immediately gained “peace of mind.”
Over the course of that day, 700 other Portland residents did the same.
Since 2004, 18 states and New York City have approved laws that make manufacturers responsible for recycling electronics, and similar statutes were introduced in 13 other states this year. The laws are intended to prevent a torrent of toxic and outdated electronic equipment — television sets, computers, monitors, printers, fax machines — from ending up in landfills where they can leach chemicals into groundwater and potentially pose a danger to public health.
The Environmental Protection Agency estimates 99.1 million televisions sit unused in closets and basements across the country. Consumer response to recycling has been enormous in states where the laws have taken effect. Collection points in Washington State, for example, have been swamped by people like Babs Smith, 55, who recently drove to RE-PC, a designated electronics collection and repurposing center on the southern edge of Seattle.
Ms. Smith’s Subaru Outback was stuffed with three aged computer towers that had languished in her basement after being gutted by her teenage sons, who removed choice bits to build their own souped-up computers. “It’s what geeks do,” she said.
Since January, Washington State residents and small businesses have been allowed to drop off their televisions, computers and computer monitors free of charge to one of 200 collection points around the state. They have responded by dumping more than 15 million pounds of electronic waste, according to state collection data. If disposal continues at this rate, it will amount to more than five pounds for every man, woman and child per year.
Use of the drop-off points was so overwhelming at first that the Washington Materials Management and Financing Authority, which oversees the program, urged consumers to consider holding off until spring.
“We were getting 18 semi loads a day when the program first started,” said Craig Lorch, owner of Total Reclaim, a warehouse on the south edge of Seattle that is among the collection points.
Still, states that pioneered the electronic recycling laws report that consumer participation remains strong over time. Maine, which was one of the first to approve such a law, in 2004, says it collected nearly four pounds of waste per person last year.
“If you make it easy, they will recycle their stuff,” said Barbara Kyle, national coordinator of the Electronics TakeBack Coalition, a nonprofit group based in San Francisco. If products are recycled rather than dumped, parts of the machines are refurbished for new use where possible; if not, they are disassembled, their glass and precious metals are recycled, and the plastics, which have no reuse market, are often shipped overseas to developing countries for disposal.
The laws vary significantly from state to state. But in most, manufacturers are responsible for the collection and recycling system, although some will pay states or counties to handle the pickup. The newest laws tend to require recycling of a broader range of items, including printers and fax machines.
Many laws, including those for New Jersey and Connecticut and New York City (none of which are yet in effect) specifically ban residents from dumping electronics into the regular trash.
Least thrilled with the patchwork of laws are electronics manufacturers. “Our hope is there will be a national law before there is a law in every state,” said Parker Brugge, vice president for environmental affairs and industry sustainability for the Consumer Electronics Association, an industry advocacy group.
Mr. Brugge said it was difficult for manufacturers to keep up with dozens of laws and rules, many of which they consider impractical. New York City, for example, is pressing manufacturers to agree to pick up at apartment buildings.
Manufacturers say a reasonable rate for collection and processing of waste is 25 to 30 cents a pound. Still it is more than they say they can recoup from reselling the metals they harvest, particularly for televisions.
Peter M. Fannon, the vice president for technology and government policy at Panasonic’s North American subsidiary, said his company would prefer a national law that would put local governments in charge of collection and the industry in charge of recycling.
“We think it is unreasonable that an individual industry be designated as trash collector,” Mr. Fannon said.
State lawmakers counter that they cannot afford to wait for a national bill. With constant upgrades in technological capability, they say, manufacturers build obsolescence into many of their designs, causing outdated electronics to become the bane of the waste system.
The E.P.A. estimates that 2.6 million tons of electronic waste were dropped into landfills in 2007, the most recent year for which data is available. Once buried, the waste leaches poisons like chlorinated solvents and heavy metals into soil and groundwater.
Recycling programs do not address the problem of electronics that are already leaching poison in landfills. Nor do they prevent the frequent shipment of plastic shells covered with chemical flame retardants overseas to poor and developing nations; once there, they are often incinerated, because they cannot be reused, and spew toxic chemicals into the air.
The Office of the Inspector General at the Justice Department has a continuing investigation into accusations that several federal prisons with electronics recycling contracts had used inmates to do the work without taking adequate safety precautions, exposing them to unhealthy levels of airborne particles.
Ultimately, said Ms. Kyle, coordinator of the Electronics TakeBack Coalition, recycling does not eliminate the root problem: the vast amount of electronics generated in the first place and fated for disposal.
Carole A. Cifrino, the environmental specialist who manages Maine’s e-waste program, said she hoped the strict recycling would eventually prompt manufacturers to rethink their designs.
“Maybe since they have some responsibility for the cleanup,” Ms. Cifrino said, “it will motivate them to think about how you design for the environment and the commodity value at the end of the life.”
Hattie Bernstein contributed reporting from Portland, Me., and Claudia Rowe from Seattle.
Correction: An earlier version of this article misidentified the Consumer Electronics Association, an industry advocacy group, as the Electronic Manufacturers Association.
A Green Way to Dump Low-Tech Electronics
By LESLIE KAUFMAN
This month, Edward Reilly, 35, finally let go of the television he had owned since his college days.
Although the Mitsubishi set was technologically outdated, it had sat for years in Mr. Reilly’s home in Portland, Me., because he did not know what else to do with it, given the environmental hazards involved in discarding it.
“It’s pretty well known that if it gets into the landfill, it gets into the groundwater,” he said. “Its chemicals pollute.”
But the day after the nationwide conversion to digital television signals took effect on June 12, Mr. Reilly decided to take advantage of a new wave of laws in Maine and elsewhere that require television and computer manufacturers to recycle their products free of charge. He dropped off his television at an electronic waste collection site near his home and, he said, immediately gained “peace of mind.”
Over the course of that day, 700 other Portland residents did the same.
Since 2004, 18 states and New York City have approved laws that make manufacturers responsible for recycling electronics, and similar statutes were introduced in 13 other states this year. The laws are intended to prevent a torrent of toxic and outdated electronic equipment — television sets, computers, monitors, printers, fax machines — from ending up in landfills where they can leach chemicals into groundwater and potentially pose a danger to public health.
The Environmental Protection Agency estimates 99.1 million televisions sit unused in closets and basements across the country. Consumer response to recycling has been enormous in states where the laws have taken effect. Collection points in Washington State, for example, have been swamped by people like Babs Smith, 55, who recently drove to RE-PC, a designated electronics collection and repurposing center on the southern edge of Seattle.
Ms. Smith’s Subaru Outback was stuffed with three aged computer towers that had languished in her basement after being gutted by her teenage sons, who removed choice bits to build their own souped-up computers. “It’s what geeks do,” she said.
Since January, Washington State residents and small businesses have been allowed to drop off their televisions, computers and computer monitors free of charge to one of 200 collection points around the state. They have responded by dumping more than 15 million pounds of electronic waste, according to state collection data. If disposal continues at this rate, it will amount to more than five pounds for every man, woman and child per year.
Use of the drop-off points was so overwhelming at first that the Washington Materials Management and Financing Authority, which oversees the program, urged consumers to consider holding off until spring.
“We were getting 18 semi loads a day when the program first started,” said Craig Lorch, owner of Total Reclaim, a warehouse on the south edge of Seattle that is among the collection points.
Still, states that pioneered the electronic recycling laws report that consumer participation remains strong over time. Maine, which was one of the first to approve such a law, in 2004, says it collected nearly four pounds of waste per person last year.
“If you make it easy, they will recycle their stuff,” said Barbara Kyle, national coordinator of the Electronics TakeBack Coalition, a nonprofit group based in San Francisco. If products are recycled rather than dumped, parts of the machines are refurbished for new use where possible; if not, they are disassembled, their glass and precious metals are recycled, and the plastics, which have no reuse market, are often shipped overseas to developing countries for disposal.
The laws vary significantly from state to state. But in most, manufacturers are responsible for the collection and recycling system, although some will pay states or counties to handle the pickup. The newest laws tend to require recycling of a broader range of items, including printers and fax machines.
Many laws, including those for New Jersey and Connecticut and New York City (none of which are yet in effect) specifically ban residents from dumping electronics into the regular trash.
Least thrilled with the patchwork of laws are electronics manufacturers. “Our hope is there will be a national law before there is a law in every state,” said Parker Brugge, vice president for environmental affairs and industry sustainability for the Consumer Electronics Association, an industry advocacy group.
Mr. Brugge said it was difficult for manufacturers to keep up with dozens of laws and rules, many of which they consider impractical. New York City, for example, is pressing manufacturers to agree to pick up at apartment buildings.
Manufacturers say a reasonable rate for collection and processing of waste is 25 to 30 cents a pound. Still it is more than they say they can recoup from reselling the metals they harvest, particularly for televisions.
Peter M. Fannon, the vice president for technology and government policy at Panasonic’s North American subsidiary, said his company would prefer a national law that would put local governments in charge of collection and the industry in charge of recycling.
“We think it is unreasonable that an individual industry be designated as trash collector,” Mr. Fannon said.
State lawmakers counter that they cannot afford to wait for a national bill. With constant upgrades in technological capability, they say, manufacturers build obsolescence into many of their designs, causing outdated electronics to become the bane of the waste system.
The E.P.A. estimates that 2.6 million tons of electronic waste were dropped into landfills in 2007, the most recent year for which data is available. Once buried, the waste leaches poisons like chlorinated solvents and heavy metals into soil and groundwater.
Recycling programs do not address the problem of electronics that are already leaching poison in landfills. Nor do they prevent the frequent shipment of plastic shells covered with chemical flame retardants overseas to poor and developing nations; once there, they are often incinerated, because they cannot be reused, and spew toxic chemicals into the air.
The Office of the Inspector General at the Justice Department has a continuing investigation into accusations that several federal prisons with electronics recycling contracts had used inmates to do the work without taking adequate safety precautions, exposing them to unhealthy levels of airborne particles.
Ultimately, said Ms. Kyle, coordinator of the Electronics TakeBack Coalition, recycling does not eliminate the root problem: the vast amount of electronics generated in the first place and fated for disposal.
Carole A. Cifrino, the environmental specialist who manages Maine’s e-waste program, said she hoped the strict recycling would eventually prompt manufacturers to rethink their designs.
“Maybe since they have some responsibility for the cleanup,” Ms. Cifrino said, “it will motivate them to think about how you design for the environment and the commodity value at the end of the life.”
Hattie Bernstein contributed reporting from Portland, Me., and Claudia Rowe from Seattle.
Correction: An earlier version of this article misidentified the Consumer Electronics Association, an industry advocacy group, as the Electronic Manufacturers Association.
GOOD NEW STORY FROM TECHWORLD
Developing countries at risk from dumped PCs
Passing the 'toxic buck'.
Tom Jowitt, Techworld
24 June 2009
Advertisement
Developing countries are risk of becoming a dumping ground for e-waste unless there are effective controls in place to stop Western countries from 'passing the toxic buck'.
So said analyst house Gartner in a new report entitled "Emerging Markets Are Becoming Dumping Grounds for Secondary PCs."
"Although reuse must be considered preferable to most other forms of waste management, without effective controls, exports for reuse can be an excuse for dumping, and even in the best case result in 'passing the toxic buck' to emerging economies, which are seldom equipped to deal with this problem in an environmentally and socially responsible way," said Meike Escherich, principal research analyst at Gartner.
According to Gartner 37 million secondary PCs were refurbished and exported to emerging markets during 2008, and it is predicting that this number will rise to 69 million by 2012.
Until recently, old IT equipment usually headed to the nearest local landfill, but in 2007 the European Union's Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive became law in the UK which stated that e-waste must be dismantled or recycled by specialist contractors because of its toxic content.
Earlier this year however, an investigation revealed that thousands of computers and other e-waste items in the UK were still being packaged into cargo containers and shipped illegally to African countries.
Gartner says that these 'secondary PCs' will eventually need to be disposed of. In 2007, nearly 68 million secondary PCs had to be discarded worldwide. In emerging countries, approximately 15 million secondary PCs had to be discarded in 2007. Gartner estimates that by 2012, emerging countries will need to dispose of a total of 30 million secondary PCs annually.
"Without action, OEMs will find that an increasing number of their PCs will either end up in landfills or find their way into illegal or badly set up private 'workshops' for dismantling," Escherich said. "Neither will be advantageous for a vendor's 'green' credentials."
Gartner says that although some exported used PCs are handled responsibly in demand countries with effective regulatory regimes and by companies with advanced technologies, many end up in developing countries where they are frequently handled and disposed of unsafely. Emerging economies often lack the capacity to safely handle and dispose of used PCs, and extremely low labour costs and lack of environmental controls make unsafe recycling commonplace.
A leading exporter of refurbished IT equipment agrees, but feels Gartner should be encouraging PC makers to invest in recycling infrastructure in developing countries. Computer Aid International describes itself as the world's largest non-profit supplier of computers to developing countries. Next month, it expects to ship its 150,000 refurbished PC.
"It is correct to be concerned that emerging countries at risk of become a dumping ground for e-waste," said Tony Roberts, founder and chief executive of Computer Aid. "The key word is e-waste. We take a three or four year old computers, separate out the good pieces, and refurbish them so they can be used for another three or four years [in a developing country]." Broken or useless kit is recycled within the EC.
"Gartner should encourage the OEMs to put end of life recycling capabilities in place in Africa and the developing markets, in the same way they do so in Europe," he said.
"In Europe they pass the cost of recycling old computers onto the customer," he said. "We pay £5 ($8.26) more for each PC we buy in order to finance end of life recycling. PC makers that talk proudly of recycling in Europe, should be encouraged to do the same in Africa and South America."
"They pay [indirectly] for end of life recycling with European borders, but unfortunately their responsibility stops once they get to the Rock of Gibraltar. There should be legislation so they have to contribute to recycling of old equipment in those markets."
Passing the 'toxic buck'.
Tom Jowitt, Techworld
24 June 2009
Advertisement
Developing countries are risk of becoming a dumping ground for e-waste unless there are effective controls in place to stop Western countries from 'passing the toxic buck'.
So said analyst house Gartner in a new report entitled "Emerging Markets Are Becoming Dumping Grounds for Secondary PCs."
"Although reuse must be considered preferable to most other forms of waste management, without effective controls, exports for reuse can be an excuse for dumping, and even in the best case result in 'passing the toxic buck' to emerging economies, which are seldom equipped to deal with this problem in an environmentally and socially responsible way," said Meike Escherich, principal research analyst at Gartner.
According to Gartner 37 million secondary PCs were refurbished and exported to emerging markets during 2008, and it is predicting that this number will rise to 69 million by 2012.
Until recently, old IT equipment usually headed to the nearest local landfill, but in 2007 the European Union's Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive became law in the UK which stated that e-waste must be dismantled or recycled by specialist contractors because of its toxic content.
Earlier this year however, an investigation revealed that thousands of computers and other e-waste items in the UK were still being packaged into cargo containers and shipped illegally to African countries.
Gartner says that these 'secondary PCs' will eventually need to be disposed of. In 2007, nearly 68 million secondary PCs had to be discarded worldwide. In emerging countries, approximately 15 million secondary PCs had to be discarded in 2007. Gartner estimates that by 2012, emerging countries will need to dispose of a total of 30 million secondary PCs annually.
"Without action, OEMs will find that an increasing number of their PCs will either end up in landfills or find their way into illegal or badly set up private 'workshops' for dismantling," Escherich said. "Neither will be advantageous for a vendor's 'green' credentials."
Gartner says that although some exported used PCs are handled responsibly in demand countries with effective regulatory regimes and by companies with advanced technologies, many end up in developing countries where they are frequently handled and disposed of unsafely. Emerging economies often lack the capacity to safely handle and dispose of used PCs, and extremely low labour costs and lack of environmental controls make unsafe recycling commonplace.
A leading exporter of refurbished IT equipment agrees, but feels Gartner should be encouraging PC makers to invest in recycling infrastructure in developing countries. Computer Aid International describes itself as the world's largest non-profit supplier of computers to developing countries. Next month, it expects to ship its 150,000 refurbished PC.
"It is correct to be concerned that emerging countries at risk of become a dumping ground for e-waste," said Tony Roberts, founder and chief executive of Computer Aid. "The key word is e-waste. We take a three or four year old computers, separate out the good pieces, and refurbish them so they can be used for another three or four years [in a developing country]." Broken or useless kit is recycled within the EC.
"Gartner should encourage the OEMs to put end of life recycling capabilities in place in Africa and the developing markets, in the same way they do so in Europe," he said.
"In Europe they pass the cost of recycling old computers onto the customer," he said. "We pay £5 ($8.26) more for each PC we buy in order to finance end of life recycling. PC makers that talk proudly of recycling in Europe, should be encouraged to do the same in Africa and South America."
"They pay [indirectly] for end of life recycling with European borders, but unfortunately their responsibility stops once they get to the Rock of Gibraltar. There should be legislation so they have to contribute to recycling of old equipment in those markets."
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