our dreams of "office spacing" are the hellish realities of those overseas

anyone else see the irony?

if we do it here, it's a win-win-win situation...in the short term at least

It's greed that is poisoning people. We are naive in believing that we are doing the right thing and then some "entrepreneur" turns that good intent into profit for themselves that are realized by poisoning others.....

So then these folks are out of work? I would rather recycle here at home and make my machines better.

Its hardly the fault of the US consumer, its part the fault of the US company that sends it overseas for not overseeing the process better and part the country in question for not in-forcing stricker laws of handling this stuff. Still, nothing surprises me anymore about man-kinds willingness to shit in their back yard. I mean if we poison/pollute our environment we're the losers in the end. Pop quiz, do any of you know where the biggest landfill is in the world? I'll give you a hint, it isn't on any land mass at all.

It would really really help if tech companies wouldn't make 1 year old hardware out of date. I mean, just buying the computer off the SHELF is already outdated.

The answer isn't to make the big, evil, companies take it back. The answer is to have a Federal policy and program for recycling. However, the EPA stays away from this issue like the plague. They believe that it's not their problem.

I believe that individual states should be able to set as strict a policy as they like - like California does. But, there should be a Federal baseline by which all states have to operate.

The largest problem here is $. Nobody wants to pay to deal with this stuff. It can be recycled, and there are plenty of recyclers that can handle it. It's the transport costs that make it unprofitable to deal with. Nobody, and I mean nobody, wants to deal with transporting the crap from point of collection to point of recycling. This is where charities/non-profits with existing transport structures (Like Goodwill and Salvation Army) have come into play in CA. They get, I think, around $.17/lb to transport the stuff from stores to recyclers, and are raking it in.

Anyway, not to be long-winded, but making manufacturers take it back makes absolutely no sense from a logistics standpoint. If local won't pony up for recycling centers and Federal won't either, the only solution that will be hammered out is a patchwork of state regs with varying degrees of success.

I think the federal government should start requiring deposits on materials that can be recycled. Similar to what is done with cans and bottles in a few states. That way when you purchase a new one you have an incentive to recycle the materials through proper channels in order to get your deposit back. Of course, it would be hard to determine the deposit as all of the products are different whereas cans and bottles are pretty much similar, but I think the benefits would be substantial enough as to warrant a department specifically for this purpose. That way the government, or other body in charge of issuing the refund for the deposit, could be held accountable for the methods used in recycling those materials.

I say mandate manufacturers to collect "recycling tax" from the consumers, and route that money to the government, either local or federal, who, in turn will operate a recycling program.

A deposit system may not work unless they make the deposit obscenely high, because 3 years after paying for a product, the consumer might not give a damn about the $50 deposit he paid for his $1000 TV, and may decide the $50 is not worth his trouble trying to recycle using proper channels. However, if by paying $30 upfront guarantees him the right to just put the TV out on his driveway for a free pickup by official recyclers every other Thursday, he's not going to go out of his way to dump it "improperly".

@dearhaw: Right. Enter in the "we don't have the funds to pay for this" as said by local officials. They can raise property taxes to cover it, but who will vote for that? What about unincorporated areas? They're still screwed.

@sinz: I love it when people just say, "create a new department" or "privatize the mail". Again, where's the money going to come from to fund such an endeavor? There's no way in hell the EPA will carve a whole new dep't. out of existing budget, and nobody else will give up their budgetary dollars to fund it. After personally seeing the creation of the DHS and the huge FUBAR it created for several years, not to mention what's still going on, there's no way.

California does charge a recycling surcharge, which allows you to bring the item back to the point of purchase when you're done with it. It depends on the cost of the item, but the max is something around $8. That doesn't even come near the cost of actually recycling the item, and the retailers flipping hate it. They have to devote floor space to storing all of the crap until someone comes to get it - which makes all prices go up.

There's no disputing that pretty much everything that the Giz writes about needs to be disposed of properly, but the problem the world over is that everyone wants to do so for free, or get paid for it, like cans and bottles - because that's the model we're used to. People don't want to let it stack up in their homes until a free recycling day or drive it across town to a recycler that can handle it (if one exists in that town at all). The problem is that recycling the stuff is a cost center - break even at best. The likes of Apple and Dell do it because it's cheaper than the hourly rate of a PR firm to cover their eco-issues. HP does it so they can refill and resell ink. Cell companies do it so they can refurb and then take as a charity deduction.

I guess what I'm really trying to get at is until products are made in such a way as to increase their value to a recycler, the products will be treated like the chick with herpes - nobody wants to pick it up. Couldn't pay someone to pick it up. Nope, not in a million years. Not with your buddy doing the lifting and 3 other guys cheering him on is anyone going to pick up a 17" crt monitor.

yikes. nothing's ever easy is it?

Look at Katrina, 9/11, Social Security and the healthcare crisis. You want them involved in this??

I read this article earlier today. So what's better then:

1) Sending e-junk to be "recycled", which involves some poor bastard in China melting it down in his living room and taking a couple decades off his life in the process

or

2) Throwing it in the trash, where it ends up in a landfill and some of the toxic components might (in a few hundred years if the landfill is very poorly designed) start to leach into the groundwater

?

I'm sure someone like Apple or Dell processes their recycling the right way, but I have no idea where stuff ends up if I use, say, my city's recycling program. I presume the people who take it either sell it to the highest bidder, or pay the lowest bidder to haul it away. I imagine either way it's fairly likely to end up in China. So what's the right thing to do?

We do not need a federal agancy to do this and raise my taxes. We need to find a solution that is most cheaply implemented. The best way to do this would be to fund some reasearch into non-toxic alternatives to current manufacturing. Eventually this could make it cheaper to do it the non-toxic way. I also like the idea of making the companies take it back. Maybe then they will make an effort to make thier stuff upgradable, and support it for more than a few months.

You all should read this article from Vice magazine
[www.viceland.com]

@GregCo3000: this problem has been "known" for years, and for years has been "resolved" by governments and companies by simply covering it with dirt/move or bury it to leak to the subsoil water reservoirs. for later on go to another place to start dumping there.

It is so sad that the only solution as consumer is to a) slow down the purchase of new technology, extending the time/use of the current devices we have and b) recycle (for reuse if possible) the devices we dispose. here in Portland there is "free geek" and they take your electronics, but you need to pay fee for recycling for monitors and they suggest contribution fee for the rest of electronics.

The company referenced in this article for sending this stuff overseas is a "Tennessee-based subsidiary of a Chinese company." That little detail has seemed to go a little unnoticed, but it has pretty interesting ramifications.

why are we sending this stuff to garbage dumps?

shouldn't we have refurb companies getting this stuff for free and throwing a linux distro on it?

the rest of the tech should be recovered for the IC's atleast - that's the biggest cost in the form of dead electronics - the IC's need to be replaced.

oh well - most of this stuff has been sitting around people's houses and most likely poisoned them already and now we're dumping this crap to the garbage pickers - and they for some reason have it in their head that they are actually getting something of value and then dumping it on some other person with the same stupid mentality.

I do my best to keep every bit of electronics that breaks down and reuse it for other purposes - and for the low end processor systems I give them a linux distro and a good cleaning, instant terminal for anyone that wants to get on the internet.

Sure, make the companies take back their old and unused equipment. They will just do what is most profitable for the company, and ship the recycling business to an overseas location. Kind of like all the customer service representatives from Dell, M$, etc. that are located in Bangalore, India.

"Make companies take back their own goods for recycling."
Yeah, because that sounds completely fair and reasonable. Car manufacturers should be required to take back all used cars for recycling, too! Those greedy, self-serving companies!11!1! Yeah! Make them pay!

"It's better than the hands of underpaid, underprotected workers trying to scratch out a living."
So we'll be putting underpaid, underprotected workers out of jobs. Nice.

@hughjass:

Yeah, because that sounds completely fair and reasonable.

Actually, it does. It would force companies to rethink their designs to make the products more componentized for disassembly, with greener materials, and easier to recycle.

Anyone with a clue about electronics and microchip manufacturing will tell you that it is impossible to eliminate toxins from the manufacturing process, as well as the actual make-up of the components.

Remember: Water is a solvent.

See also: Zodiac by Neil Stephenson.

Hey, don't touch that.

It poisoned some worker's broad!

We've got so many problems here at home: trade and budget deficits that keep growing without any sign of stopping; a huge health care crisis looming as the Baby Boomers hit their golden years and no money in Medicare; oops! there's no money in the Social Security program for them, either; the dollar is losing value against just about every currency out there; gas is over $3.00 a gallon and rising; our educational system is so bad the only way we can remain competitive is to import foreign trained engineers; and, hey! I know! Let's tell China how to run their county! I'm sure they will appreciate our sage advice, and maybe no one at home will realize what a lousy job both parties are doing domestically. Yeah, that's the ticket!