To mark International E-Waste Day, Oct. 14, consumers worldwide are urged to collect dead and/or unused electronics and electrical products and give them a second life through reuse or repair, or recycle them properly.  

Above all: stop tossing them out in household waste bins.

The Global E-waste Monitor 2024, authored by UNITAR in cooperation with ITU, reported almost a quarter of end-of-life electronic waste ends up in home trash, squandering billions of dollars worth of copper, gold and other precious metals, materials critical to the production of such products, along with valuable plastics, and glass.

The 14 million tonnes of e-waste (dead or unused products with a battery or plug) discarded with ordinary household waste equals the weight of ~24,000 of the world’s heaviest passenger aircraft – enough to form an unbroken queue of giant planes from London to Helsinki, NY to Miami, Cairo to Tripoli, or Bangkok to Calcutta.

Says Pascal Leroy, Director General of the Brussels-based Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) Forum: “Small electronic and electrical goods such as mobile phones, toys, remote controls, game consoles, headphones, lamps, screens and monitors, heating and cooling equipment, and chargers are everywhere. And electronic components embedded in consumer products large and small – even clothing – are now omnipresent. The 844 million e-cigarettes thrown away in 2022 alone contained enough lithium, for example, to power 15,000 electric cars.”

Adds Magdalena Charytanowicz of the WEEE Forum in charge of International E-Waste Day:”We know what to do, and we can do better.”

Ms. Charytanowicz says the place to start is the junk drawer, a common feature of homes around the world.

Globally, there are 108 mobile phone subscriptions per 100 people. And earlier surveys have shown that European households alone store about 700 million unused or non-functioning mobile phones – an average of more than two per household.

Why people hoard

She adds that “hoarding is an issue predominantly in wealthier countries. Elsewhere, reasons for keeping appliances are often personal data concerns or a desire to recover some of their value.”

A 2022 survey helped explain why so many EU households and businesses fail to bring WEEE in for repair or recycling.

Undertaken by WEEE Forum members – not-for-profit entities that collect e-waste from households and businesses on behalf of manufacturers, and consolidated by UNITAR’s Sustainable Cycles (SCYCLE) Programme, the survey showed the average European household contains 74 e-products, such as phones, tablets, laptops, electric tools, hair dryers, toasters and other appliances (excluding lamps). The survey sample included 8,775 households across a diverse group of European Union countries – Portugal, Netherlands, Italy, Romania and Slovenia – combined with a UK survey, 

Of the 74 average total e-products, 13 were being hoarded (9 of them unused but working, 4 broken).

Top reasons for hoarding in Europe:

• Might use it again in the future (46%) 
• Plan to sell / give it away (15%)
• Has sentimental value (13%)
• Might have value in the future (9%)
• Don’t know how to dispose of it (7%)

Others include:

• Didn’t have time, forgot about it, does not take up too much space (3%)
• Planned use in secondary residence (3%)
• Presence of sensitive data (2%)
• There is no incentive to recycle (1%)

Complementary research reveals what motivates people to recycle e-waste:

• Knowledge – understanding where and how to dispose of e-waste and why our actions can make a difference; 
• Convenient collection points – making it easy for consumers to make the right gesture;
• Compensation – some consumers are motivated by financial or other type of compensations; 
• Social norms – following what others do
• Care for the environment – a growing concern for many;
• Benefits to charities – doing something good for others, such as offering unused appliances for reuse, is a great motivator 

People are often surprised by information about the positive CO2 impact of e-waste recycling or simply happy to have done the ‘right thing’. See videos at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwqZMb95b3Q 

Many Producer Responsibility Organisations (PROs) – members of the WEEE Forum – organise communication campaigns and provide collection points, now more than 183,000 in all. To date, PROs have collected, cleaned, and recycled or sent for refurbishment 41.6 million tonnes of WEEE, with 3.1 million tonnes collected in 2022. 

Great progress is being made but everyone has a role to play as the volumes of e-waste generated grow rapidly, says Ms. Charytanowicz.

Urging people to Join the E-Waste Hunt — Retrieve, Recycle and Revive — the WEEE Forum outlined the Five Ws of E-Waste recycling:

What: Any product with a battery or plug.

Where: WEEE Forum members’ collection points: weee-forum.org/members, or any other official e-waste collection point

Why: According to Global E-waste Monitor 2024 (UNITAR / ITU):

• Global e-waste management reduces CO2 equivalent emissions by 93 billion kg annually, equivalent to the annual emissions of more than 20 million cars
• Proper e-waste recycling avoids leakages of harmful substance such as lead or cadmium to the environment
• In 2022, e-waste produced globally contained approximately 4 billion kg of metals classified as critical raw materials, including 3.9 billion kg of aluminium, 34 million kg of cobalt, and 28 million kg of antimony
• Recovering and reusing secondary raw materials from e-waste in 2022 avoided the need to mine 900 million tonnes of ore (the weight of 17,200 Titanics)

Who: You

When: Now

Says Cosmas Luckyson Zavazava, Director, ITU Telecommunication Development Bureau: “Almost 80% of the world’s population today own a mobile phone. Among them, there are those who have several devices, in some cases, each with its own type of chargers, cables and accessories. I call on everyone to ensure the proper recycling of these devices, which is key to reducing their environmental impact and minimizing resource scarcity.”

“We need to keep monitoring the development in the years to come, as the global rise of e-waste generation is outpacing the formal collection and recycling by five times since 2010,” said Kees Baldé, Senior Scientific Specialist at UNITAR SCYCLE, and a lead researcher behind the Global e-Waste Monitor.”

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International e-Waste Day (#ewasteday)

Last year, over 195 organisations from 55 countries supported the 4th International E-Waste Day observance. This year, the WEEE Forum invited all organisations involved in effective and responsible e-waste management to plan awareness-raising activities for 14 October. These range from social media, TV and radio campaigns to city or school e-waste collections or even artistic performances.  

www.internationalewasteday.com 

WEEE Forum 

The WEEE Forum (a.i.s.b.l.*) is a Brussels-based for-impact association representing 53 sector-mandated producer responsibility organisations (PROs) worldwide. Through our members’ collective knowledge of the technical, business and operational aspects of collection, logistics, de-pollution, processing, preparing for reuse, and reporting of e-waste, we are at the forefront of making extended producer responsibility an effective waste management policy. Our mission is to be the world’s foremost e-waste competence centre, excelling in the implementation of the circularity principle. 

Member PROs are based in Europe, Oceania, Africa, Asia and the Americas: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Colombia, Czechia, Cyprus, Denmark, Italy, Greece, Georgia, France, Iceland, India, Ireland, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Moldova, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nigeria, North Macedonia, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Moldova, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, South Africa, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.

Since their founding, the WEEE Forum’s producer responsibility organisations have collected, de-polluted and recycled or sent for preparation for re-use 41.6 million tonnes of WEEE. More than 3.1 million tonnes of this was collected in 2022.

(*) Association internationale sans but lucratif/international non-for-profit association

www.weee-forum.org

Correspondence: pascal.leroy@weee-forum.org 

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WEEE Forum member contacts (for national e-waste insights):

• Australia: ANZRP, Carla Vasconi, carla.vasconi@anzrp.com.au 
• Austria: UFH, Stephanie Zsifkovits stephanie.zsifkovits@ufh.at 
• Belgium: Recupel, Annelies Evens annelies.evens@recupel.be
• Bosnia and Herzegovina: ZEOS, Mahir Bjelonja mahir.bjelonja@zeos.ba 
• Canada: GO RECYCLE, Mylène Mercier mylene@gorecycle.com; EPRA, Jay Illingworth jay.illingworth@epra.ca; MARR, Chris Campbell, ccampbell@marrbccollab.ca 
• Colombia: EcoCómputo, Maria Camila Robayo comunicaciones@ecocomputo.com; Red verde, Néstor Hincapie jefaturatecnica@redverde.co 
• Cyprus: WEEE Cyprus, Stelios Athanasiou s.athanasiou@weeecyprus.com.cy 
• Czechia: ELEKTROWIN, Jan Marxt jan.marxt@elektrowin.cz 
• Denmark: elretur, Jesper Bøttcher jb@elretur.dk 
• France: Ecologic, Elisabeth Stefann esteffann@ecologic-france.com; ecosystem, Claire LEMARCHAND clemarchand@ecosystem.eco Soren, Nicolas Defrenne  nicolas.defrenne@soren.eco 
• Greece: Appliances Recycling, Christiana Bochali cbochali@electrocycle.gr; FOTOKIKLOSI SA, Dimitra Kyriakopoulou kyriakopoulou@fotokiklosi.gr 
• Iceland: URVINNSLUSJODUR, Edda Andrésdóttir edda@irf.is 
• India: Karo Sambhav, Pranshu Singhal Pranshu@karosambhav.com
• Ireland: WEEE Ireland, Robyn Macken robyn@weeeireland.ie 
• Italy: Cobat, Valentina Negri v.negri@cobatraee.it; PV CYCLE Italia, jan.clyncke@pvcycle.org; Erion, Alice Olgiati alice.olgiati@erion.it 
• Lithuania: EGIO, Iveta Šmigelskienė iveta@gia.lt 
• Luxembourg: Ecotrel, Saoussen Gouiaa communication@ecotrel.lu 
• Malta: WEEE Malta, Sergio Mallia sergio@weeemalta.org; WEEE Recycle, Mario Schembri mschembri@greenpak.com.mt 
• Moldova: MoldControl, Iulian Gamureac, i.gamureac@moldcontrol.md 
• Netherlands: Stichting OPEN (Wecycle), Danielle Elings Danielle.Elings@stichting-open.org 
• Nigeria: EPRON, Ibukun Faluyi info@epron.org.ng 
• North Macedonia: ElKolekt, Lidija Miloshevska, elkolekt@gmail.com  
• Norway: RENAS AS, Anja Rönesen anja.ronesen@renas.no; Norsirk, Guro Kjørsvik Husby guro@norsirk.no 
• Poland: ElektroEko, Anna Podsiadlo anna.podsiadlo@elektroeko.pl 
• Portugal: Electrão, Ana Matos ana.matos@electrao.pt 
• Romania: ARCwaste, Teodor Tobolcea teodor.tobolcea@arcwaste.ro; Asociatia ENVIRON, Roxana Puia roxana.puia@environ.ro; ECOTIC, Ema Cumpătă ema.cumpata@ecotic.ro 
• Slovakia: Envidom, Peter Valent peter.valent.pv@gmail.com 
• Slovenia: ZEOS, Ursa Dolinsek urska.dolinsek@zeos.si 
• South Africa: Circular energy, management@circular-energy.org; ERA, Ashley du Plooy ashley@eranpc.co.za  
• Spain: ECOLEC, Rafael Serrano rafael.serrano@ecolec.es; Recyclia, Enrique Santos esantos@recyclia.es; Ecotic, Raquel Ayora rayora@ecotic.es 
• Sweden: Recipo, Hugo Chorell hugo@recipo.com; El-Kretsen, Mårten Sundin marten.sundin@el-kretsen.se 
• Switzerland: Swico, Jakob Knauf jakob.knauf@swico.ch; SENS eRecycling, Nando Erne nando.erne@sens.ch 
• United Kingdom: REPIC Ltd, Hannah Graham hgraham@repic.co.uk : PV CYCLE UK, Alexia Tilgenkamp media@pvcycle.org

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News release in full, click here

Example coverage:

Agencia EFE, via Infobae, Argentina: Cada año se deshecha basura electrónica equivalente al peso de 24.000 aviones (Every year, electronic waste equivalent to the weight of 24,000 airplanes is disposed of), click here

Full coverage summary, click here

A record 62 million tonnes (Mt) of e-waste was produced in 2022, 

Up 82% from 2010; On track to rise another 32%, to 82 million tonnes, in 2030; Billions of dollars worth of strategically-valuable resources squandered, dumped; 

Just 1% of rare earth element demand is met by e-waste recycling

Geneva / Bonn – The world’s generation of electronic waste is rising five times faster than documented e-waste recycling, the UN’s fourth Global E-waste Monitor (GEM) reveals today.

The 62 million tonnes of e-waste generated in 2022 would fill 1.55 million 40-tonne trucks, roughly enough trucks to form a bumper-to-bumper line encircling the equator, according to the report from ITU and UNITAR.

Meanwhile, less than one quarter (22.3%) of the year’s e-waste mass was documented as having been properly collected and recycled in 2022, leaving US $62 billion worth of recoverable natural resources unaccounted for and increasing pollution risks to communities worldwide.

Worldwide, the annual generation of e-waste is rising by 2.6 million tonnes annually, on track to reach 82 million tonnes by 2030, a further 33% increase from the 2022 figure.

E-waste, any discarded product with a plug or battery, is a health and environmental hazard, containing toxic additives or hazardous substances such as mercury, which can damage the human brain and coordination system.

The report foresees a drop in the documented collection and recycling rate from 22.3% in 2022 to 20% by 2030 due to the widening difference in recycling efforts relative to the staggering growth of e-waste generation worldwide.

Challenges contributing to the widening gap include technological progress, higher consumption, limited repair options, shorter product life cycles, society’s growing electronification, design shortcomings, and inadequate e-waste management infrastructure.

The report underlines that if countries could bring the e-waste collection and recycling rates to 60% by 2030, the benefits – including through minimizing human health risks – would exceed costs by more than US $38 billion.

It also notes that the world “remains stunningly dependent” on a few countries for rare earth elements, despite their unique properties crucial for future technologies, including renewable energy generation and e-mobility.

Additional data highlights are appended.

Comments

“Amidst the hopeful embrace of solar panels and electronic equipment to combat the climate crisis and drive digital progress, the surge in e-waste requires urgent attention.”
Nikhil Seth, Executive Director, UNITAR

“From discarded televisions to dumped telephones, an enormous amount of e-waste is generated around the world. The latest research shows that the global challenge posed by e-waste is only going to grow. With less than half of the world implementing and enforcing approaches to manage the problem, this raises the alarm for sound regulations to boost collection and recycling. The Global E-waste Monitor is the world’s foremost source for e-waste data allowing us to track progress overtime and to make critical decisions when it comes to transitioning to a circular economy for electronics”
Cosmas Luckyson Zavazava, Director, ITU Telecommunication Development Bureau

“No more than 1% of demand for essential rare earth elements is met by e-waste recycling. Simply put: Business as usual can’t continue. This new report represents an immediate call for greater investment in infrastructure development, more promotion of repair and reuse, capacity building, and measures to stop illegal e-waste shipments. And the investment would pay for itself in spades.”
Kees Baldé, lead author, UNITAR

“Many in today’s society use multiple computers and phones, an ever-growing number of new appliances, monitors and sensors, e-bikes, e-scooters, clothes, toys, and furniture with embedded electronics, electric tools, and energy-saving equipment such as LEDs, photovoltaics, and heat pumps. Urban and remote areas are increasingly connected to the Internet, and a growing number of data centers cater to the needs of the digital transformation. In the face of all this, concrete steps are urgently needed to address and reduce e-waste. Improved e-waste management could result in a global net positive of US $38 billion, representing a significant economic opportunity while addressing climate change and health impacts.”

Ruediger Kuehr, Senior Manager, Sustainable Cycles (SCYCLE) Programme, UNITAR / Adjunct Professor, University of Limerick (Ireland)

The Global E-waste Monitor shows that we are currently wasting US $91 billion in valuable metals due to insufficient e-waste recycling. We must seize the economic and environmental benefits of proper e-waste management; otherwise, the digital ambitions of our future generations will face significant risks.”

Vanessa Gray, Head, Environment & Emergency Telecommunications Division, ITU Telecommunication Development Bureau

By the numbers:

62 million tonnes: e-waste generated in 2022, equal to the weight of 107,000 of world’s largest (853-seat), heaviest (575 tonne) passenger aircraft – enough to form an unbroken queue from New York to Athens, from Nairobi to Hanoi, or from Hong Kong to Anchorage

14 million tonnes (22.3%): estimated mass of e-waste trashed, mostly landfilled, in 2022

31 million tonnes: estimated weight of metals embedded in e-waste in 2022, along with 17 million tonnes of plastics and 14 million tonnes of other materials (minerals, glass, composite materials, etc.)

US $91 billion: The value of metals embedded in 2022 e-waste, including US $19 billion in copper, US $15 billion in gold, and US $16 billion in iron.

US $28 billion: value of secondary raw materials (mostly iron) reclaimed by “urban mining” of e-waste in 2022

900 million tonnes: Primary ore extraction avoided by reclaiming materials through documented e-waste recycling

93 million tonnes: CO2-equivalent emissions avoided by formal e-waste management – recaptured refrigerants (41 million tonnes), avoided metals mining (52 million tonnes)

Recycling rates

42.8%: Formally documented collection and recycling rates in Europe

<1%: Formally recycled e-waste in African countries

~50% (30 million tonnes): E-waste generated by Asian countries (of which relatively few have enacted legislation or established clear e-waste collection targets)

17.6 kg: Per capita e-waste generation in Europe, followed by Oceania (16.1 kg) and the Americas (14.1 kg). These regions also have the highest documented per capita collection and recycling rates (7.5 kg in Europe, 6.7 kg in Oceania and 4.2 kg in the Americas)

16 million tonnes: e-waste collected and recycled outside of formal systems in high- and upper-middle income countries that have developed e-waste management infrastructure.

18 million tonnes: e-waste managed mostly by the informal sector in low and lower-middle income countries with no e-waste management infrastructure. Any material values recovered by the informal sector are largely (perhaps more than) offset by extremely high health and environmental costs

5.1 million tonnes (8.2% of the global total): e-waste shipped across borders in 2022, of which ~3.3 million tonnes (65%) was shipped from high-income to middle- and low-income countries through uncontrolled, undocumented movements

E-waste by category, selected examples

33% (20.4 million tonnes): Proportion of e-waste made up of small devices (e.g. toys, microwave ovens, vacuum cleaners, e-cigarettes), of which 12% are recycled

4.6 million tonnes: e-waste in the small IT and telecommunication equipment category (e.g. laptops, mobile phones, GPS devices, routers), with only 22% documented collection and recycling rate

2.4 million tonnes: Expected mass of retired photovoltaic panels in 2030, four times as much as the 600,000 tonnes in 2022

Among the report’s many observations:

Typically, collection and recycling rates are highest for heavier and bulkier equipment categories, such as large devices, temperature exchange equipment, screens and monitors

81 countries had e-waste legislation in 2023, up from 78 in 2019. Of the 81 countries, 67 had a legal instrument governing e-waste management with provisions promoting extended producer responsibility (EPR)

The enforcement of e-waste policy, legislation, and regulation “remains a genuine challenge globally, and the stagnation of the global e-waste collection and recycling rate is likely exacerbated by the fact that only 46 countries have collection rate targets and only 36 have recycling rate targets.”

Selected report infographics (available at https://bit.ly/3wcjfz5)

Media coverage highlights:

The Global E-waste Monitor

Since 2014, the Global E-waste Monitor (www.globalewaste.org) has been the world’s foremost source of up-to-date data and reporting on progress in policy, regulation, and offering projections.

The 2024 edition is a collaborative product of the Global E-waste Statistics Partnership with support from the Fondation Carmignac.

Earlier global and regional reports: https://ewastemonitor.info

Join the conversation on social media using hashtag #eWaste

The UN Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR), unitar.org

As a dedicated training arm of the United Nations System, the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR) provides innovative learning solutions to individuals, organizations and institutions to enhance global decision-making and support country-level action for shaping a better future. UNITAR was created in 1963 to train and equip young diplomats from newly independent UN Member States with the knowledge and skills needed to navigate through the diplomatic environment. Over the years, UNITAR has acquired unique expertise and experience in designing and delivering a variety of training and learning activities, benefiting learners mainly from developing countries. With the strategy fully aligned with the 2030 Agenda, we support Governments and other stakeholders to achieve Sustainable Development Goals.

The Bonn, Germany-based Sustainable Cycles (SCYCLE) Programme, hosted by UNITAR, provides world-class research and action on e-waste. SCYCLE aims to enable societies to reduce the environmental burden caused by the production, consumption and disposal of ubiquitous goods.

The International Telecommunication Union, itu.int

The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) is the United Nations specialized agency for information and communication technologies (ICTs), driving innovation in ICTs together with 193 Member States and a membership of over 1,000 companies, universities, and international and regional organizations. Established in 1865, it is the intergovernmental body responsible for coordinating the shared global use of the radio spectrum, promoting international cooperation in assigning satellite orbits, improving communication infrastructure in the developing world, and establishing the worldwide standards that foster seamless interconnection of a vast range of communications systems. From broadband networks to cutting-edge wireless technologies, aeronautical and maritime navigation, radio astronomy, oceanographic and satellite-based earth monitoring as well as converging fixed-mobile phone, Internet and broadcasting technologies, ITU is committed to connecting the world.

Fondation Carmignac, fondationcarmignac.com

Fondation Carmignac was founded in 2000 by Edouard Carmignac, a French entrepreneur, CEO and Chairman of asset management company Carmignac. Today, it is structured around three main pillars: the Carmignac Photojournalism Award, which annually funds the production of investigative photo reportage on human rights violations and geo-strategic issues, the Carmignac Collection, which has over 300 works of contemporary art, and Villa Carmignac, an art venue offering annual exhibitions and a rich cultural programme in a 2000-square-meter gallery set in a 15-hectare estate at the heart of a protected site on Porquerolles island.

Fondation Carmignac contributes to the Global E-waste Monitor photographs by laureates of the 13th edition of the Carmignac Photojournalism Award. Investigative journalist Anas Aremeyaw Anas and photojournalists Muntaka Chasant and Bénédicte Kurzen explore the complexities of e-waste trafficking from European ports to Ghana scrapyards, revealing its complex, globalized cycle and highlighting the opportunities and environmental impact of the e-waste economy.

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Media coverage highlights

The Associated Press, via The Washington Post, United States (46,834,485)UN says e-waste from trashed electric devices is piling up and recycling isn’t keeping pace https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/03/20/electronic-waste-kenya-united-nations-ewaste-environment/736f825e-e6c4-11ee-9eba-1558f848ec25_story.html

Reuters, United Kingdom
World ‘losing the battle’ against electronic waste, UN findshttps://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/reuters/article-13219285/World-losing-battle-against-electronic-waste-UN-finds.html

Agence France Presse, via Yahoo! News, United States (20,965,545)Rising scourge of e-waste a ‘catastrophe’ for environment: UNhttps://www.yahoo.com/news/rising-scourge-e-waste-catastrophe-151400470.html

ANSA, Italy (17,787,503)Rifiuti elettrici ed elettronici -3,1% nel 2023, meno tvElectrical and electronic waste -3.1% in 2023, less TVhttps://www.ansa.it/sito/notizie/economia/2024/03/21/rifiuti-elettrici-ed-elettronici-31-nel-2023-meno-tv_1f53a287-1538-4467-9a78-c81f9c820036.html

Deutsche Presse Agentur, via DIE WELT, Germany (16,339,581)Die Welt produziert Jahr für Jahr mehr Elektroschrott GermanyThe world produces more electronic waste every year https://www.welt.de/newsticker/dpa_nt/infoline_nt/wissenschaft_nt/article250670507/Die-Welt-produziert-Jahr-fuer-Jahr-mehr-Elektroschrott.html

Scripps News, United States, via MSN.com (132,453,294)The world’s e-waste problem is getting worse, the UN sayshttps://www.msn.com/en-us/health/medical/the-world-s-e-waste-problem-is-getting-worse-the-un-says/ar-BB1kkepL
Daily Mail, United Kingdom (76,191,155)
The vast scale of Earth’s e-waste: 62 million tonnes of phones, TVs and vapes were discarded worldwide in 2022 – weighing the equivalent of 6,000 Eiffel Towers, report reveals https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-13218177/waste-phones-tvs-gadgets-quantity.html

CBS News, United States (44,417,564)There’s so much electronic waste in the world it could span the equator – and it’s still growing https://www.cbsnews.com/news/electronic-waste-ewaste-span-equator-growing/

Livemint, India (30,717,494)Electronic waste increasing at concerning rate: Reporthttps://lifestyle.livemint.com/smart-living/environment/electronic-waste-recycling-pollution-itu-technology-report-111711022324740.html

Le Monde, France (25,370,042)« Explosion » des déchets électroniques menace l’environnement et la santé, alerte l’ONU“Explosion” of electronic waste threatens the environment and health, warns the UNhttps://t.co/EWFKMNA9iE

La Repubblica, Italy (21,211,147)Nel 2022 abbiamo generato 62 milioni di tonnellate di rifiuti elettroniciIn 2022, we generated 62 million tons of e-wastehttps://www.repubblica.it/green-and-blue/2024/03/20/news/raee_rifiuti_elettronici_produzione_globale_riciclo-422345465/

Salon, via Yahoo! News, United States (20,965,545)Silicon mountain: Our obsession with electronics is drowning the world in e-waste https://www.yahoo.com/news/silicon-mountain-obsession-electronics-drowning-093005426.html

O Globo, Brazil (18,416,874)Afundando na sucata: lixo eletrônico cresce cinco vezes mais rápido do que reciclagem, diz ONUSinking in scrap: electronic waste grows five times faster than recycling, says UN https://oglobo.globo.com/economia/tecnologia/noticia/2024/03/23/afundando-na-sucata-lixo-eletronico-cresce-cinco-vezes-mais-rapido-do-que-reciclagem-diz-onu.ghtml

Full coverage summary: click here

News release in full, click here

Every year, unused cables, electronic toys, LED-decorated novelty clothes, power tools, vaping devices, and countless other small consumer items often not recognized by consumers as e-waste amount to 9 billion kilograms of e-waste, one-sixth of all e-waste worldwide.  

This “invisible” category of e-waste in one place would equal the weight of almost half a million 40-tonne trucks, enough to form a 5,640 km bumper-to-bumper line of trucks from Rome to Nairobi. 

Invisible e-waste is the focus of the 6th annual International E-Waste Day on Saturday, Oct. 14 (weee-forum.org/iewd-about).

Many of these devices, such as vapes, gaining in popularity in some societies, contain lithium, which makes their battery rechargeable but also causes serious fire risks when the device is discarded. Moreover, the European Commission considers lithium a ‘strategic raw material’ crucial to Europe’s economy and green energy transition, but supplies are at risk. Most of these materials are thrown away in household bins and elsewhere. 

The Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) Forum, which organises International E-Waste Day, commissioned the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR) to calculate the annual quantities of “invisible” e-waste items in millions of kilograms, in millions of pieces, and in kg and pieces per capita.  

The results, presented in full here https://bit.ly/3PVFLnh, include the following:

E-waste generated of selected UNU-KEYs related to invisible e-waste in 2022 using dataset of global e-waste monitor of 2020 from UNITAR. Source: C.P. Baldé, T. Yamamoto, V. Forti, United Nations Institute for Training and Research, Statistical briefing on invisible e-waste for International E-waste Day 2023, 2023, Bonn.

^ contains double counting with above categories

(* Note: The UNITAR figures above represent an estimate, and UNU-Key categories cover larger categories like ‘small IT’ where some of the items are ‘invisible’ (like USB sticks) and some others easy to recognise as e-waste, e.g. a keyboard).

Some 3.2 billion kg, 35%, of the roughly 9 billion kg of invisible e-waste are in the e-toy category: race car sets, electric trains, music toys, talking dolls and other robotic figures, biking computers, drones, etc. – in all, some 7.3 billion individual items discarded annually, an average of about 1 e-toy for every man, woman and child on Earth.

Meanwhile, the estimated 844 million vaping devices each year amount to a mountain of e-waste equal to three times the weight of New York’s Brooklyn Bridge or six Eiffel Towers.

The study also found that 950 million kg of cables containing precious, easily recyclable copper were discarded last year – enough cable to circle the Earth 107 times.

Many are stored in homes, perhaps put aside for potential future use.  And many people don’t realise they could be recycled – a huge sleeping resource at a time when demand for copper is forecast to rise 6 fold by 2030  in Europe alone to meet the needs of strategic sectors such as renewable energy, electric mobility, industry, communications, aerospace and defense. 

The value of raw materials in the global e-waste generated in 2019 was estimated at US $57 billion, most of that attributed to iron, copper and gold components.  Of the overall total, 1/6th or $9.5 billion in material value each year, is in the invisible e-waste category. 

Other examples of common, invisible e-waste items in households include toothbrushes, shavers, external drives and accessories, headphones and earbuds, remote controls, speakers, LED lights, power tools, household medical equipment, heat and smoke detectors and many others.

Says Pascal Leroy, Director-General of the WEEE Forum: “Invisible e-waste goes unnoticed due to its nature or appearance, leading consumers to overlook its recyclable potential.”

“People tend to recognise household electrical products as those they plug in and use regularly. But many people are confused about the waste category into which ancillary, peripheral, specialist, hobby, and leisure products fit and how to have them recycled.” (related videos:

Adds Mr. Leroy: “Many people don’t recognize some battery-powered or wired-in products like a smoke detector or smart thermostat as an electrical product because they don’t have a plug. They are also unaware of the hazardous components e-waste contains. If not properly treated, substances like lead, mercury or cadmium can leach into and contaminate the soil and water.”

The WEEE Forum asks everybody to get their e-waste to the appropriate municipal collection facility. 

“A significant amount of electronic waste is hidden in plain sight,” says Magdalena Charytanowicz of the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) Forum. “Sadly, invisible e-waste often falls under the recycling radar of those disposing of them because they are not seen as e-waste.  We need to change that and raising awareness is a large part of the answer. Much effort and progress was made around plastic pollution and people are now more conscious about it, especially with a UN treaty on plastics in the works by 2024. We hope the same will occur in the e-waste field.”

In Europe, thanks to 20 years of Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) legislation, 55% of e-waste generated is now officially collected and reported. Still, according to the United Nations global e-waste monitor,  other parts of the world show much slower growth rates in its collection, and globally, the reported average collection rate is just over 17%.

Says Virginijus Sinkevičius, European Commissioner for the Environment: “This International E-Waste Day, the EU acknowledges the pressing e-waste challenge and is proactively setting a leadership example. The ongoing expansion in electronic device production and consumption has significant environmental and climate repercussions. Introducing Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) in e-waste legislation two decades ago has laid the groundwork for an innovative ecosystem and advanced technologies. While EPR has elevated environmental standards, our journey is not complete. We must promote a circular economy for electronics, as with other products, not only to decrease our environmental impact but also to fortify the value chain, reducing its reliance on third countries.

E-waste is the world’s fastest-growing waste stream. 

Says Jan Vlak, the president of the WEEE Forum: “Not only producers but all relevant actors, including regulators, consumers, refurbishers, reuse outfits, scrap dealers, retailers and recyclers, must play a role in the EPR system to successfully increase the collection of e-waste. We need to update the EPR principle, make it congruent with circular economy principles and embed this new vision in EU legislation and in a global treaty to harmonise standards and define critical e-waste management obligations.

Background

According to the United Nations, 8 kg of e-waste per person will be produced worldwide in 2023. Only 17.4% of this waste, containing harmful substances and precious materials, will be recorded as properly collected, treated, and recycled globally.

The remaining tens of millions of tonnes will be placed in landfills, burned, illegally traded, improperly treated, or hoarded in households.

Even in Europe, which leads the world in e-waste recycling, only 55% of e-waste is officially reported as properly collected and recycled, and the lack of public awareness is among the factors preventing countries from developing circular economies for electronic equipment.

International E-waste Day

International E-waste Day (#ewasteday)is an annual awareness-raising campaign initiated by the WEEE Forum and its members. It takes place every year on the 14th of October. It aims to highlight the growing issue of electronic waste and promote responsible e-waste management.

According to a 2022 study developed by the UN Institute for Training & Resources (UNITAR) and WEEE Forum members in 6 countries (UK, Italy, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia and The Netherlands), of the 74 e-products found in an average household, 13 are being hoarded (9 of them unused but working and 4 broken). Small consumer electronics and accessories (such as headphones or remote controls – often not recognised as electronic items) rank top of the list of hoarded products. If these gadgets remain in the drawers and cupboards, the valuable resources they contain do not re-enter the manufacturing cycle.

When electronic devices and components are disposed of improperly because they are not recognised as e-waste, they often end up in landfills or incinerators. Electronics contain various hazardous substances such as lead, mercury, cadmium, and flame retardants, which can leach into soil and water sources, pollute ecosystems and pose risks to human health.

These devices also contain valuable resources, including precious metals like gold, silver and copper, and Critical Raw Materials, which are crucial for the green transition and production of new electronic devices. When e-waste is not recycled correctly, these valuable materials go to waste.

The WEEE Forum 

The WEEE Forum is a Brussels-based, impactful not-for-profit international association representing 52 producer responsibility organisations on all continents worldwide, all of them mandated by producers of electrical and electronic products to manage e-waste responsibly. Together with its members, they are at the forefront of turning the Extended Producer Responsibility principle into an effective electronic waste management policy approach through our combined knowledge of the technical, business and operational aspects of collection, logistics, de-pollution, processing, preparing for reuse and reporting of e-waste. It is the biggest organisation of its kind in the world. 

Since their founding, the PROs in the WEEE Forum have collected, de-polluted and recycled or sent for preparation for re-use of more than 35 million tonnes of WEEE. In addition, our members operate over 114,000 WEEE collection points, and two-thirds of them are market leaders in their countries.

About: www.weee-form.org

Coverage highlights:

Agence France Presse, France, via Yahoo! News, United States (58,017,212)
$9.5 bn of key metals in overlooked electronic waste: https://news.yahoo.com/9-5-bn-key-metals-000222518.html

Agencia EFE, Spain, via Infobae, Argentina (60,708,789)Muchos de los residuos electrónicos que desechamos contienen materias primas esencialesMany of the electronic waste we discard contain essential raw materialshttps://www.infobae.com/america/agencias/2023/10/12/muchos-de-los-residuos-electronicos-que-desechamos-contienen-materias-primas-esenciales/

Washington Post 
How to shop for kids without adding to the mountain of plastic
https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-solutions/2023/11/23/kids-holiday-gifts-sustainable/

Grist, Discarded toys are creating an e-waste disaster. Here’s how to stop it.
https://grist.org/accountability/discarded-toys-are-creating-an-e-waste-disaster-heres-how-to-stop-it/

Asian News International, via Dailyhunt India (14,641,137)Discarded vapes annually equal six Eiffel Towers in weight https://m.dailyhunt.in/news/india/english/lokmat08408565043306-epaper-lokmaten/discarded+vapes+annually+equal+six+eiffel+towers+in+weight-newsid-n546458780?listname=newspaperLanding&topic=featuredstories&index=7&topicIndex=0&mode=pwa

BBC, United Kingdom (143,558,352)Nearly half a billion small tech items thrown away https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-67082005

Daily Mail, United Kingdom (87,359,497)Around 844 MILLION vapes are dumped worldwide every year – equivalent in weight to six Eiffel Towers, figures revealhttps://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-12622463/Around-844-MILLION-vapes-dumped-worldwide-year-equivalent-weight-six-Eiffel-Towers-figures-reveal.html

UK Press Association, via Daily Mail, United Kingdom (87,359,497)Nearly half a billion small electricals thrown away in last year – studyhttps://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/pa/article-12623135/Nearly-half-billion-small-electricals-thrown-away-year–study.html

India Times, India (60,549,913)How “Invisible” E-Waste Such As Discarded Vapes Annually Equal Six Eiffel Towers In Weighthttps://www.indiatimes.com/news/india/how-invisible-e-waste-such-as-discarded-vapes-annually-equal-six-eiffel-towers-in-weight-617504.html

The Independent, United Kingdom (49,845,234)Vapes weighing equivalent to 3 Brooklyn Bridges discarded annually in mountain of ‘invisible’ electronic wastehttps://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/electronic-waste-plastics-vapes-drones-b2427223.html

La Vanguardia, Spain (33,672,030)Cuidado donde tiras el cable: la pequeña basura electrónica es un gran problema ambientalBe careful where you throw the cable: the small electronic waste is a big environmental problem https://www.lavanguardia.com/natural/20231012/9293056/cuidado-tiras-cable-pequena-basura-electronica-gran-problema-ambiental.html

The Verge, United States (22,113,312)
Vapes, chargers, and other ‘invisible’ e-waste are a 9-million-ton problem
https://www.theverge.com/2023/10/11/23912751/vapes-chargers-invisible-ewaste-recycling

Newsweek, United States (24,657,820) Toys Top List of 10 Most Common Types of Electric Waste https://www.newsweek.com/toys-top-common-electronic-waste-recycling-1833565

New Scientist, United Kingdom (3,110,157) Toys produce far more electronic waste than vapes https://www.newscientist.com/article/2397075-toys-produce-far-more-electronic-waste-than-vapes/

Coverage summary: click here

News release in full: click here

2022 International E-waste Day slogan: ‘Recycle it all, no matter how small!’ Despite world-leading e-waste management, ~30% of Europe’s stock of mobile phones no longer used; Most are long hoarded before becoming waste; #1 reason for hoarding end

Experts expect roughly 5.3 billion mobile / smartphones will drop out of use this year.

Stacked flat atop one another at an average depth of 9 mm that many disused phones would rise roughly 50,000 km – 120 times higher than the International Space Station; one-eighth of the way to the moon.  

And, despite their valuable gold, copper, silver, palladium and other recyclable components, experts expect a majority will disappear into drawers, closets, cupboards or garages, or be tossed into waste bins bound for landfills or incineration (see background notes, appended).  

And, surprisingly, mobile phones rank 4th among small EEE products most often hoarded by consumers.

Organizers today released the results of surveys conducted to reveal why so many households and businesses fail to bring Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) in for repair or recycling.

The surveys were conducted from June to September, 2022 by the members of the WEEE Forum and the results were consolidated by the UN Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR) Sustainable Cycles (SCYCLE) Programme.

The surveys show that, of 8,775 European households in six countries representing the diversity of the European Union – Portugal, Netherlands, Italy, Romania and Slovenia, and separate UK survey, the average household contains 74 e-products such as phones, tablets, laptops, electric tools, hair dryers, toasters and other appliances (excluding lamps). 

Of that 74 average total e-products, 13 are being hoarded (9 of them unused but working, 4 broken).

The top 5 hoarded small EEE products (by number of pieces*), Europe:  

1. Small consumer electronics and accessories (e.g. headphones, remote controls)
2. Small household equipment (e.g. clocks, irons,)
3. Small information technology equipment (e.g. external hard drives, routers, keyboards, mice)
4. Mobile and smart-phones
5. Small equipment for food preparation (e.g. toasters, food processing, grills) 

(* By weight, discarded washing machines and other white appliances outweigh all other types of e-waste by far.)

Meanwhile, LED lamps rank tops the list of products most likely to be trashed.

Hoarded small kitchen and household equipment, laptops and tablets as share of total stock of those products in households:

1. Italy (29%)
2. Netherlands (17%)
3. United Kingdom (14%)
4. Slovenia (12%)
5. Romania (9%)
6. Portugal (8%)
7. Lebanon (4%)

Top 5 reasons for hoarding WEEE of any kind, Europe:

1. I might use it again in the future (46%) 
2. I plan on selling it / giving it away (15%)
3. It has sentimental value (13%)
4. It might have value in the future (9%)
5. I don’t know how to dispose of it (7%)

Others

• Didn’t have time, forgot about it, does not take up too much space (3%)
• Planned use in secondary residence (3%)
• Presence of sensitive data (2%)
• There is no incentive to recycle (1%)

Says Pascal Leroy, Director General of the WEEE Forum, the organisation behind International E-Waste Day: “We focussed this year on small e-waste items because it is very easy for them to accumulate unused and unnoticed in households, or to be tossed into the ordinary garbage bin. People tend not to realise that all these seemingly insignificant items have a lot of value, and together at a global level represent massive volumes.”

“The producer responsibility organisations in the WEEE Forum that manage the collection of e-waste are constantly working to make the proper disposal of small e-waste simple and convenient for users and households,” says Mr. Leroy.

“Providing collection boxes in supermarkets, pick up of small broken appliances upon delivery of new ones and offering PO Boxes to return small e-waste are just some of the initiatives introduced to encourage the return of these items.”

Adds Magdalena Charytanowicz of the WEEE Forum in charge of International E-Waste Day: “As noted in our short public video (https://youtu.be/r8XIoquM40Y), in 2022 alone, small EEE items such as cell phones, electric toothbrushes, toasters and cameras produced worldwide will weight an estimated total of 24.5 million tonnes – four times the weight of the Great Pyramid of Giza. And these small items make up a significant proportion of the 8% of all e-waste thrown into trash bins and eventually landfilled or incinerated.”

“These devices offer many important resources that can be used in the production of new electronic devices or other equipment, such as wind turbines, electric car batteries or solar panels – all crucial for the green, digital transition to low-carbon societies.”

In the past twenty years, the PROs in the WEEE Forum have collected, de-polluted, recycled or prepared for re-use more than 30 million tonnes of WEEE.

They have spent enormous sums on communication campaigns. Still, challenges ahead remain daunting. 

On 7 Dec. 2022 the Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) Grand Challenge Conference (http://weeeforumconference.com) will mark the 20th anniversary of the WEEE Forum, a consortium of reputable e-waste collection organizations.

The conference will also mark the 20th anniversary of EU Directive 2002/96/EC, the world’s first supranational (EPR) legislation on e-waste soon to be revised and updated. 

Virginijus Sinkevičius, European Commissioner for the Environment, Oceans and Fisheries, commented: “The continuing growth in the production, consumption and disposal of electronic devices have huge environmental and climate impacts. The European Commission is addressing those with proposals and measures throughout the whole product life-cycle, starting from design until collection and proper treatment when electronics become waste.”

“Moreover, preventing waste and recovering important raw materials from e-waste is crucial to avoid putting more strain on the world’s resources. Only by establishing a circular economy for electronics, the EU will continue to lead in the efforts to urgently address the fast-growing problem of e-waste.”

Dr. Kees Baldé, Senior Scientific Specialist at UNITAR SCYCLE, and a lead researcher behind the Global e-Waste Monitor, noted that many small electronic products such as disposable airplane earbuds or cables and adapters accumulate largely unnoticed in many households. All the defunct earbuds accumulated by 2026 strung together would stretch around the moon three times.”  

“Moreover, over the past decade the growth in generated e-waste has been considerably higher than the growth in recycling, thus it is important to remind people of the importance of reusing or returning every single piece of electronics or electrical product that is forgotten about in household drawers.”

UN-led thought paper outlines options

Also launched to coincide with International e-Waste Day: a UN “thought paper” at https://www.itu.int/itu-d/sites/environment/ (available Oct. 14) offers a series of ideas and options for reducing the global problem.

Led by the UN’s International Telecommunication Union (ITU), with contributions from the WEEE Forum – which organizes International E-waste Day – and StEP, the Solving the eWaste Problem Initiative – the paper details the pros and cons of a wide range of options, including, for example:

• Making all entities that have access to e-waste subject to minimum legal obligations (All Actors principle)
• Deposit return and take-back schemes
• Digital product passports, and
• An international EPR regime of states agreeing on baseline standards for EEE treatment and depollution, and harmonized EEE definitions, categories, methodologies and principles.

UN certificate available to graduates of new 90-minute online e-waste training program 

Meanwhile, UNITAR, the UN Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR), today also launched the first self-paced e-waste online training course open to anyone. A UNITAR certificate is available to graduates of the roughly 1.5 hour course (lectures, videos, illustrations, tests and a final exam).

The course will be available Oct. 14 at https://www.uncclearn.org 

Says Nikhil Seth, UNITAR’s Executive Director and an instrumental figure in development of the Sustainable Development Goals, “UNITAR is proud of this new course on e-waste management as an outstanding example of how to use scientific findings in a practical way for international training and capacity building in an area of critical environmental importance.”

Adds Dr. Ruediger Kuehr, Founder of the SCYCLE Programme and Head of UNITAR’s Office in Bonn: “ International E-waste Day reminds us annually of the avalanche of problems we face unless we take appropriate measures, without which global e-waste could double to 100 million tonnes or more in the next 30 years. Consumption of electronics in many countries continues to grow, with more and more gadgets and products or embedded in such as furniture, clothes and toys, all of which eventually become e-waste.”

“We need to understand this growth and counter it with everyone involved: national authorities, enforcement agencies, Producer Responsibility Organisations, original equipment manufacturers, recyclers, researchers and consumers themselves.”

Further reading: In-depth review of the WEEE Collection Rates and Targets in Europe  https://weee-forum.org/projects-campaigns/weeeflows

Background

Total global stock of mobile phones (in use and hoarded): 16 billion (source: UNITAR’s internal Global E-Waste Monitor databases; ~8 billion people in the world with approx. 2 phones per person. 

See also:

• https://www.bankmycell.com/blog/how-many-phones-are-in-the-world
• https://www.statista.com/statistics/245501/multiple-mobile-device-ownership-worldwide/ 

E-waste generated by mobile and smartphones, 2022 only: 5.3 billion pieces (covers all devices that will be thrown in the bin, recycled or discarded in any other way).

Most were hoarded before (the 5.3 billion figure excludes currently hoarded mobile and smartphones).  

Notes: The EU generates fewer mobile phones per inhabitant than other world regions, contrary to other forms of e-waste. Also, low quality devices quickly break and need replacing.

* * * * *

About 

International e-Waste Day (#ewasteday)

Last year over 170 organisations from 78 countries worldwide supported the fourth International E-Waste Day observance. This year too, the WEEE Forum invited all organisations involved in effective and responsible e-waste management to plan awareness raising activities for 14 October. These range from social media, TV and radio campaigns to city or school e-waste collections or even artistic performances. 

www.internationalewasteday.com 

The WEEE Forum 

The WEEE Forum is a Brussels-based for-impact, not-for-profit international association representing forty-six producer responsibility organisations on all continents, across the globe. Together with our members, we are at the forefront of turning the Extended Producer Responsibility principle into an effective electronic waste management policy approach through our combined knowledge of the technical, business and operational aspects of collection, logistics, de-pollution, processing, preparing for reuse and reporting of e-waste. It is the biggest organisation of its kind in the world. 

Our mission is to be the world’s foremost e-waste competence centre excelling in the implementation of the circularity principle. The PROs are based in Europe, the Americas, Africa, Oceania and Asia. In 2021, its member organisations reported collection and proper de-pollution, repair and recycling in excess of 3 million tonnes of WEEE. 

Since their founding, the PROs in the WEEE Forum have collected, de-polluted and recycled or sent for preparation for re-use more than 30 million tonnes of WEEE. In addition, our members operate over 114,000 WEEE collection points and two thirds of them are market leaders in their countries.

www.weee-forum.org; Correspondence: pascal.leroy@weee-forum.org 

* * * * *

Media coverage highlights

CNN, United States (132 million) What to do with your old phones, gadgets and other e-waste
https://edition.cnn.com/2022/10/14/tech/e-waste-tips/index.html

Agence France Presse, via Hindustan Times, India (49,376,780)
Over 5 billion cell phones may be discarded in 2022: Report  https://www.hindustantimes.com/technology/over-5-billion-cell-phones-may-be-discarded-in-2022-report-101665678804826.html

Deutsche Presse Agentur, Germany, via Der Spiegel (21,345,710)
Milliarden ausgediente Smartphones werden unsachgemäß entsorgt https://www.spiegel.de/netzwelt/gadgets/milliarden-ausgediente-smartphones-werden-unsachgemaess-entsorgt-a-67b3566d-2561-4101-8fa2-ed40b1a7319a

Agencia EFE, Spain via MSN.com, United States (169,707,030) La acumulación de móviles en desuso está alcanzado niveles insostenibles https://www.msn.com/es-us/noticias/mundo/la-acumulaci%c3%b3n-de-m%c3%b3viles-en-desuso-est%c3%a1-alcanzado-niveles-insostenibles/ar-AA12Vtfv

UK Press Association, United Kingdom via Daily Mail, United Kingdom (78,872,375) Households sitting on £5.6bn of unwanted tech, research suggests  https://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/pa/article-11312223/UK-households-sitting-5-6bn-unwanted-tech-research-suggests.html

Bloomberg, United States, There Are Critical Minerals Hiding in Your Junk Drawer https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-10-14/5-3-billion-phones-will-join-a-hidden-mine-of-e-waste-this-year?srnd=premium&leadSource=uverify%20wall

BBC, United Kingdom, via Yahoo! News, United States (63,498,127) E-waste: 5 billion phones to be thrown away in 2022 https://www.yahoo.com/news/e-waste-5-billion-phones-014828202.html

TIME,

The Hill, United States (17,212,612) 5.3 billion phones to become waste in 2022 https://thehill.com/policy/equilibrium-sustainability/3687227-equilibrium-sustainability-5-3-billion-phones-to-become-waste-in-2022/

Daily Mail, UK, via MSN.com, United States (potential reach 169,707,030) Average UK household could raise £200 by selling unwanted gadgets https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/average-uk-household-could-raise-%c2%a3200-by-selling-unwanted-gadgets/ar-AA12Vt3s

2) UK households store 527 million unwanted electrical items https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/uk-households-store-527-million-unwanted-electrical-items/ar-AA12SzRb

The Independent, United Kingdom (44,247,701)
UK households sitting on £5.6bn of unwanted tech, research suggests https://www.independent.co.uk/business/uk-households-sitting-on-ps5-6bn-of-unwanted-tech-research-suggests-b2202146.html

El Mundo, Spain (27,990,567) Basura electrónica: por qué guardamos en casa la mayoría de teléfonos móviles que ya no usamos https://www.elmundo.es/ciencia-y-salud/medio-ambiente/2022/10/13/6347f7d5fc6c83796f8b4598.html

La Repubblica, Italy (22,437,702) Nella Giornata internazionale dei rifiuti elettronici si spegneranno oltre 5 miliardi di dispositivi https://www.repubblica.it/economia/rapporti/energitalia/sostenibilita/2022/10/13/news/nella_giornata_internazionale_dei_rifiuti_elettronici_si_spegneranno_oltre_5_miliardi_di_dispositivi-369704876/

n-tv Germany (21,523,622) Technikschrott wird gehortet, statt recycelt https://www.n-tv.de/wissen/Technikschrott-wird-gehortet-statt-recycelt-article23649297.html

DIE WELT, Germany (18,994,734) Jährlich landen Milliarden Handys im Abfall https://www.welt.de/wissenschaft/article241580307/Elektroschrott-Jaehrlich-landen-Milliarden-Handys-im-Abfall.html

Gadgets 360 India (16,676,073)Smartphone Waste to Constitute Over 30 Percent of World’s Total Mobiles in 2022: Report https://gadgets360.com/mobiles/news/smartphones-e-waste-over-5-billion-out-of-16-billion-mobile-phones-2022-weee-forum-report-3429381

Univision Television Network, United States (16,188,806)Por qué es tan perjudicial que guardes el celular viejo en un cajón  https://www.univision.com/noticias/medio-ambiente/tecnologia-telefonos-celulares-reciclaje-basura

ORF Online, Austria (7,832,963)Mehr als fünf Milliarden Handys Abfall https://science.orf.at/stories/3215552/

Iefimerida, Greece (3,764,038)Περίπου 5,3 δισ. κινητά τηλέφωνα θα πεταχτούν το 2022 -Ελάχιστα θα ανακυκλωθούν https://www.iefimerida.gr/tehnologia/kinita-tilefona-petahtoyn-2022-na-anakyklothoyn

Forbes México, Mexico (2,519,113)5,300 millones de celulares se convertirán en basura a final de año https://www.forbes.com.mx/5300-millones-de-celulares-se-convertiran-en-basura-a-final-de-anio/

Yahoo! News Taiwan, Taiwan (11,263,232)電子垃圾泛濫 2022年有53億手機成廢物  https://tw.news.yahoo.com/%E9%9B%BB%E5%AD%90%E5%9E%83%E5%9C%BE%E6%B3%9B%E6%BF%AB-2022%E5%B9%B4%E6%9C%8953%E5%84%84%E6%89%8B%E6%A9%9F%E6%88%90%E5%BB%A2%E7%89%A9-002348793.html

WEB, Germany (12,229,811)13 Geräte pro Haushalt: Zu viel Elektronik wird gehortet  https://web.de/magazine/digital/13-geraete-haushalt-elektronik-gehortet-37381042

Báo Mới, Viet Nam (5,457,584)Ngày này năm xưa 14/10: Ngày truyền thống ngành Tổ chức xây dựng Đảng; thành lập Hội Nông dân Việt Nam.  https://baomoi.com/ngay-nay-nam-xua-14-10-ngay-truyen-thong-nganh-to-chuc-xay-dung-dang-thanh-lap-hoi-nong-dan-viet-nam/c/43992952.epi

Xinhua News Agency (搜狐新闻) via Sohu, Mainland China (60,317,411)
报告估计全球今年53亿部手机被废置
https://www.sohu.com/a/592700148_267106

Merdeka.com, Indonesia (27,540,089)
Berapa Banyak Ponsel yang akan Dibuang Tahun Ini? Simak Datanya
https://www.merdeka.com/dunia/berapa-banyak-ponsel-yang-akan-dibuang-tahun-ini-simak-datanya.html

Haber Turk, Turkey (25,608,489)
Dünyada 2022’de 5,3 milyar cep telefonunun çöpe atılacağı tahmin ediliyor
https://www.haberturk.com/ankara-haberleri/29153096-dunyada-2022de-5-3-milyar-cep-telefonunun-cope-atilacagi-tahmin-ediliyor

The Times of India, (25,572,919)
Roughly 5.3 billion mobile phones possessed worldwide will become waste in 2022: Report
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/gadgets-news/roughly-5-3-billion-mobile-phones-possessed-worldwide-will-become-waste-in-2022-report/articleshow/94856115.cms

Sky News, United Kingdom (22,970,244)
Stop hoarding your phones, Brits urged – here’s how to recycle them
https://news.sky.com/story/stop-hoarding-your-phones-brits-urged-heres-how-to-recycle-them-12720074

Daum, Korea (21,696,948)
전세계 160억대 휴대전화 중 올해만 ’53억대 이상’ 폐기된다
https://v.daum.net/v/20221014160406136

ANSA, Italy (18,182,248)Oltre 5 miliardi di telefonini in disuso nel 2022  https://www.ansa.it/sito/notizie/cronaca/2022/10/14/oltre-5-miliardi-di-telefonini-in-disuso-nel-2022_ab44bffc-d0c1-4f94-8cc6-9398b4f445a7.html

SAPO, Portugal (8,869,708)Europeus têm em casa 13 equipamentos eléctricos que não usam https://marketeer.sapo.pt/europeus-tem-em-casa-13-equipamentos-electricos-que-nao-usam/
2) Frigoríficos e computadores antigos formam escultura gigante em Belém https://marketeer.sapo.pt/frigorificos-e-computadores-antigos-formam-escultura-gigante-em-belem/

Europa Press, Spain (5,650,878)Los auriculares y los mandos a distancia son los productos electrónicos que más se acumulan en los hogares https://www.europapress.es/portaltic/gadgets/noticia-auriculares-mandos-distancia-son-productos-electronicos-mas-acumulan-hogares-20221014173502.html
2) Fundación Ecolec gestionó casi 15.000 toneladas de residuos de pequeños aparatos eléctricos y electrónicos en 2021  https://www.europapress.es/sociedad/medio-ambiente-00647/noticia-fundacion-ecolec-gestiono-casi-15000-toneladas-residuos-pequenos-aparatos-electricos-electronicos-2021-20221014120405.html

Anadolu Agency, Turkey (8,031,259)Dünyada 2022’de 5,3 milyar cep telefonunun çöpe atılacağı tahmin ediliyor https://www.aa.com.tr/tr/dunya/dunyada-2022de-5-3-milyar-cep-telefonunun-cope-atilacagi-tahmin-ediliyor/2711378

Central News Agency, Taiwan (2,632,522)研究：2022年53億支手機變廢物 危險材質威脅環境  https://www.cna.com.tw/news/aopl/202210140333.aspx

Indo Asian News Service, via ProKerala, India (9,912,459)5.3 bn mobile phones will become waste this year, warn experts  https://www.prokerala.com/news/articles/a1354156.html

Popular Science, United States (3,347,432)People will throw away about 5.3 billion phones this year  https://www.popsci.com/environment/waste-5-billion-phones-this-year/

La Croix, France (2,133,951)Revente, recyclage… Comment profiter de la ressource de nos vieux smartphones https://www.la-croix.com/Sciences-et-ethique/Revente-recyclage-Comment-profiter-ressource-vieux-smartphones-2022-10-14-1201237710

News release in full, click here

Full coverage summary, click here

1st Latin American e-waste report covers 13 countries: Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru, Uruguay, Venezuela

Electronic waste in 13 Latin American countries rose by 49% between 2010 and 2019, roughly the world average, but just 3% was collected and safely managed, a fraction of the 17.4% global average, according to the UN’s first assessment of Latin America’s e-waste volume, legislation, and management infrastructure.

In 2019, e-waste generated by 206 million citizens in the 13 countries reached 1,300,000 tonnes (1.3 megatonnes, of which almost 30% was plastic) – equal in weight to a 670 km line of fully-loaded 40-ton trucks.  The comparable figure in 2010 was 900,000 tonnes, generated by about 185 million citizens.

While informal recyclers “cherry pick” some valuable elements from waste electronics and electrical equipment, some 97% is improperly managed; just 3% is known to be collected and treated in facilities using environmentally sound methods.

The findings are published in the “Regional E-waste Monitor for Latin America, Results for the 13 Countries Participating,” produced by the Sustainable Cycles (SCYCLE) Programme, co-hosted by the UN University (UNU) and the UN Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR).  

It was developed under the ‘Strengthening of National Initiatives and Enhancement of Regional Cooperation for the Environmentally Sound Management of POPs

in Waste of Electronic or Electrical Equipment (WEEE)’ project (in Spanish: PREAL – Proyecto Residuos Electrónicos America Latina), funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and coordinated by the UN Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO).

(The full “Regional E-waste Monitor for Latin America” is available in English at https://bit.ly/REM-EN, and Spanish at https://bit.ly/REM-ES)

“E-waste constitutes one of the fastest-growing streams of physical waste in today’s global environment and is a threat to sustainable development,” the report says.

However, few countries collect internationally-comparable e-waste statistics.  This report was created with the cooperation of 13 countries to support and facilitate environmentally-sound management of e-waste in the region, says co-author Ruediger Kuehr, the Senior Manager of UNITAR SCYCLE (previously hosted by United Nations University).

The hazardous substances in the region’s e-waste comprises at least 2200 kg of mercury, 600 kg of cadmium, 4.4 million kg of lead, 4 million kg of brominated flame retardants, and 5.6 megatonnes of greenhouse gas-equivalents (due to refrigerants).

These substances “are poorly managed within the region and are likely to be untreated, generating various risks to the stability of a healthy environment,” according to the report.

Meanwhile, “managing e-waste could be an economic opportunity,” says co-author Kees Baldé, Senior Scientific Specialist at UNITAR SCYCLE.  “The e-waste generated regionally in 2019 contained 7000 kg of gold, 310 kg of rare earth metals, 591 million kg of iron, 54 million kg of copper, and 91 million kg of aluminum, representing a total value of roughly US $1.7 billion of secondary raw materials.”

Key statistical findings: 

• On an average annual per capita basis, e-waste generation rose from 4.7 kilograms in 2010 to 6.7 kilograms in 2019, ranging from 13.2 kg in Costa Rica to 2.5 kg in Nicaragua. 
• The volume of electrical and electronic equipment (EEE) placed on the market fluctuated between 2010 and 2019, from 1.7 Mt (1.7 million tonnes, or 8.9 kg per inhabitant) in 2010, to 1.9 Mt in 2017, and 1.7 Mt (8.1 kg per inhabitant) in 2019.
• One-third (33%) of the region’s e-waste consists of small equipment (e.g. microwaves, grills and toasters, speakers, cameras).  The next largest categories: large equipment (e.g. dishwashers, washing machines, ovens, central heating systems) and temperature exchange equipment (e.g. fridges, freezers, air conditioners, heat pumps), each with 21%. One or two appliances in the latter categories are found in typical households – bulky, heavy appliances with long lifespans compared with small equipment, sold in higher numbers and more frequently discarded. The region’s smallest category in terms of e-waste generation is lamps (3% of the region’s e-waste weight).
• The volume of EEE plastic placed on the market decreased over the years, from 470,000 tonnes (2.49 kg/inh) in 2010 to 460,000 tonnes (2.22 kg/inh) in 2019 due to changes in technology, for example, from cathode ray tube (CRT) screens in computers and televisions to flat-panel displays, as well as material substitutions by manufacturers and shifting demand in some EEE categories.
• 380,000 tonnes of e-waste plastic was generated in the 13 countries in 2019, of which 31,000 tonnes contained toxic brominated flame retardants (BRF), suspected of causing neurobehavioral effects and endocrine disruption. Almost all of the plastics containing BRF are contained in just three e-waste categories: small equipment (16,000 tonnes), small IT (10,000 tonnes), and screens (5,000 tonnes)  
• Data is unavailable on the volume of Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) in e-waste plastic managed in an environmentally-sound way.
• The countries in the study collected and managed a total of 36,000 tonnes (0.21 kg per inhabitant) of e-waste in 2019. (Guatemala data is being assessed but unavailable as the report went to press). 
• Costa Rica has the highest e-waste collection of 8.0 percent (1.0 kg per inhabitant) of its total e-waste generated, followed by Chile with 5.0 percent (0.4 kg per inhabitant). 
• Annual EEE growth rates are slowing but still positive in all categories except screens and monitors, the mass of which is dropping as heavy cathode ray tube (CRT) screens in computers and televisions are replaced on the market by substantially lighter flat-panel displays.
• Argentina, Costa Rica, and Chile manufacture EEE and their components domestically; all 10 other countries rely entirely on imports. 

All 13 participating countries 

• have some legal and regulatory frameworks for waste management but only Bolivia, Chile, Costa Rica, Ecuador, and Peru have instituted specific legislation for e-waste and Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) systems focusing on e-waste regulation. 
• have hazardous waste regulation that includes POPs, but none has legislation specifically for POPs from e-waste.
• have ratified the Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal, which controls the transboundary movement of e-waste, and enacted national bans on e-waste imports.  

However, “the enforcement of these measures remains a significant challenge,” the report says, adding that many of the 13 countries do not submit transboundary movement reports to the Basel Convention, making monitoring and mapping difficult.  

“Low quality of data and control of transboundary movement of e-waste through the Basel Convention poses a threat to the environmentally sound management of e-waste and illegal movements.”

The report calls on all countries in the region to introduce and enforce either: 

a) a robust legal and policy framework focused on ESM of e-waste and POPs contained in e-waste, or 

b) monitor and reinforce existing systems to make them more efficient and effective. 

It adds that adequate financing and monitoring of the systems, and the cooperation of all stakeholders, are essential elements for setting up and sustaining successful policies. 

The report concludes with detailed individual country profiles and elaborates on seven recommendations, headlined: 

• Prevent more
• Be more aware
• Collect more
• Pollute less
• Pay adequately
• Work more safely, and 
• Train more

* * * * * 

About 

Electrical and Electronic Equipment (EEE) encompasses all products powered by a battery or plug, including laptops, mobile phones, servers, fridges, washing machines, dishwashers, cooking and other kitchen appliances, many toys, and musical instruments. EEE is increasing rapidly, and spreading quickly in emerging sectors such as electric transport, clean energy production, and smart cities, which base their services on EEE and sensors. 

The Regional E-waste Monitor for Latin America is produced by the Sustainable Cycles (SCYCLE) Programme and co-hosted by the United Nations University (UNU) and the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR), in partnership with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). 

This Regional E-waste Monitor was funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF) within the framework of the ‘Strengthening of National Initiatives and Enhancement of Regional Cooperation for the Environmentally Sound Management of POPs in Waste of Electronic or Electrical Equipment (WEEE)’ project activities, known primarily as the PREAL (Proyecto Residuos Electrónicos América Latina Project) which is implemented by the United

Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO).

United Nations University (UNU) 

UNU is an autonomous component of the UN General Assembly dedicated to generating and transferring knowledge and strengthening capacities relevant to global issues of human security, development, and welfare. The University

operates through a worldwide network of research and training centres and programmes, coordinated by the UNU Centre in Tokyo. 

www.unu.edu 

The United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR)

UNITAR is a dedicated training arm of the United Nations, with a mission of developing the individual, institutional, and organisational capacity of countries and other United Nations stakeholders through high quality learning solutions and related knowledge products and services as a means for enhancing global decision-making and providing support at the country level in overcoming global challenges. 

www.unitar.org 

The SCYCLE Programme, recently transitioned from UNU to UNITAR, envisions enabling societies to reduce the environmental load from production, use, and disposal of ubiquitous goods, especially EEE, to sustainable levels by means of independent, comprehensive, and practical research and training, providing more thorough fact bases for policy development and decision making. SCYCLE leads the global e-waste research and related trainings, and advances sustainable e-waste management strategies based on life-cycle thinking. 

www.scycle.info 

The United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO)

UNIDO has over 50 years’ experience of promoting and accelerating inclusive and sustainable industrial development (ISID) in Member States across the world. The Organization’s programmatic focus is mainly on creating shared prosperity, advancing economic competitiveness, safeguarding the environment and strengthening knowledge and institutions. 

www.unido.org 

The Global Environment Facility (GEF)

The GEF has over 27 years of experience and focuses on helping tackle our planet’s most pressing environmental problems. GEF is an international partnership of 183 countries, international institutions, civil society organizations and the private sector that addresses global environmental issues in protected areas, promotes sustainable landscape and seascape, sustainable forest management and land management, GHG emission reduction, integrated water resources management, safe disposal of hazardous chemicals and the adaptation to climate change.

www.thegef.org 

******

Media coverage highlights

Agencia EFE, via Infobae, Argentina, La basura electrónica es un problema creciente en Latinoamérica, según la ONU, click here

Agencia Reforma, via La Opinion, United States, América Latina es un vertedero de basura electrónica sin control, click here

IndoAsian News Service (IANS) via ProKerala, India: 97 pc of Latin America’s e-waste improperly managed: UN, click here

Full coverage summary, click here

News release in full, click here

Of the 18 science news releases produced in 2021, 16 were environment-themed: food waste, e-waste, oceans, biodiversity, dams, and floods. And one announced 14 living male relatives of Leonardo da Vinci, advancing a project investigating his DNA. 

2 minute slideshow: Click here

These releases generated over 9,200 news articles, published at thousands of online news sites in scores of countries and dozens of languages, ~33 billion potential public impressions in all, according to the Meltwater news search engine, which estimates actual impressions via online news sites at 825 million. Millions of additional impressions were also generated via print newspapers, magazines, radio, TV and social media.

With thanks to the researchers and collaborators behind these stories, and to the many journalists who covered them, the following releases were the most noted last year.

Electronic waste generated in the Commonwealth of Independent States + Georgia rose by 50% between 2010 and 2019, roughly the world average, but overall just 3.2% was collected and safely managed, well below the 17.4% average worldwide, according to the UN’s first report dedicated to the e-waste issue in the 12 former Soviet Union countries.

The regional e-waste total jumped from 1.7 Mt to 2.5 Mt (an average 8.7 kg per citizen), with Russia generating the most e-waste in both absolute and per inhabitant terms.

The findings are published in the first-ever “Regional E-waste Monitor, CIS + Georgia,” produced by the Sustainable Cycles (SCYCLE) Programme, co-hosted by the UN University (UNU) and the UN Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR), in partnership with the UN Environment Programme (UNEP).

According to the study, the region’s e-waste spans a variety of products but three categories dominate: temperature exchange equipment (e.g. heating, air conditioning, and refrigeration units), and large equipment (e.g. washing machines or ovens) and small equipment (e.g. kitchen equipment or vacuum cleaners) account for 77%.

The annual growth rate in the region has slowed in nearly all categories but remains positive. Only screens and monitors, and small IT equipment, show negative growth rates.

“E-waste constitutes one of the fastest growing waste streams in today’s global environment and poses a significant threat to both health and sustainable development,” says Ruediger Kuehr, Director of the Sustainable Cycles Programme (SCYCLE).

“However, few countries collect internationally comparable e-waste statistics, and many countries lack the capacity to collect e-waste data at both the regional and national level. We need this data to track changes over time, establish national and international policies, limit e-waste generation, prevent illegal dumping, and promote recycling.”

This Regional E-waste Monitor for the CIS + Georgia is the first of its kind, reviewing e-waste statistics, legislation, and management, created with the aim of enhancing understanding and interpretation of the problem and facilitating the environmentally sound management of e-waste.”

“Such a summary allows for international comparisons and contributes to the development of more effective regional e-waste management systems,” he adds.

10 tonnes of gold

Co-author Kees Balde of the United Nations University underlines that managing e-waste could be an economic opportunity in the region by creating enterprises and thus jobs in the recycling sector.

E-waste generated in the CIS + Georgia in 2019 alone contained 10 tonnes of gold, half a tonne of rare earth metals, 1 million tonnes of iron, 85,000 tonnes of copper, 136,000 tonnes of aluminum, and 700 tonnes of cobalt – representing a total value of US $2.6 billion in secondary raw materials.

Meanwhile, hazardous substances in the region’s 2019 e-waste included at least 2.4 tonnes of mercury, 1.1 tonnes of cadmium, 8,100 tonnes of lead, and 4,000 tonnes of brominated flame retardants — threats to human and environmental health.

“E-waste collection rates need to increase across countries in the region, just as they need to increase elsewhere across the world,” says Dr. Balde. “This improvement can be realised through mandatory handover of e-waste to licenced facilities. Also needed are mandatory reporting obligations for all actors collecting e-waste.”

UBA president Dirk Messner emphasizes that “E-waste is one of the most challenging waste streams all over the world. The amount of electrical and electronic equipment put on the market is rising constantly and thus e-waste does. In Germany we, too, are facing the challenge to boost our collection rates to treat e-waste in the proper way. Policy makers worldwide need a comprehensive analysis of the e-waste situation – both regionally and on a national level. We are happy that through the Advisory Assistance Programme (APP) we have supported this important project. It has been a fruitful exchange and knowledge transfer for both sides.”

Other key findings in the report:

• Electrical and Electronic Equipment (EEE) placed on the market in the region increased by 10% — from 2.9 Mt (10.4 kg/inh) in 2010 to 3.2 Mt (11.0 kg/inh) in 2019.
• The CIS+ countries collected and managed 79 kt (0.3 kg/inh) of e-waste in 2019 – 3.2% of the e-waste generated — and most of the rest ends up in landfills, with informal recyclers cherry picking some valuable components.
• Belarus and Russia have large domestic EEE production industries; the other countries mostly import the EEE placed on the market.
• E-waste collection for environmentally sound management takes place in Belarus, Kazakhstan, Russia, and Ukraine.
• Belarus has the highest e-waste collection per inhabitant and a collection rate: 33.6% (2.7 kg/inh), followed by Kazakhstan (8.8%; 0.6 kg/inh).
• Some countries (e.g. Georgia, Kyrgyzstan) have no e-waste collection due to a lack of organised, separate collection infrastructure for e-waste (and/or lack official data).
• All 12 countries in the region have well-developed legal and regulatory waste management frameworks, but 6 have no specific legislation nor Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) systems
• Georgia, Moldova, and Ukraine have adopted e-waste-specific legislation or regulation
• Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Russia regulate e-waste through bylaws in national legislation (i.e. specifically mentioning e-waste in their general waste law)
• Armenia and Ukraine are drafting Extended Producer Responsibility systems for e-waste, and Uzbekistan has drafted e-waste legislation
• In most countries, the Ministry of Environment is the responsible government entity. Municipalities and other waste management authorities, as well as state-owned private companies, collect e-waste for further management, mostly landfilling
• Producers/importers also collect e-waste under the EPR, but informal operators also exist in the region and focus on valuable e-waste fractions

The report notes several initiatives and campaign strategies created in the region to create awareness of e-waste collection and recycling with active participation from both the public and private sectors. In some of the 12 countries, the projects and initiatives are conceived and driven by NGOs’ foreign donor funds. These projects that were mapped do not comprise a complete overview in the region, but nonetheless focus on:

• Establishing legal measures
• National studies to map the e-waste situation
• Initiatives to increase e-waste collection points
• Initiatives to export e-waste for environmentally sound management
• Awareness raising campaigns

The report calls on the 12 countries in the region to:

• Introduce and enforce a robust legal and policy framework focused on environmentally sound management of e-waste, or
• Monitor and reinforce existing systems to make them more efficient and effective

Also called for:

• Adequate financing of the systems, monitoring, and cooperation of all stakeholders — essential for ensuring that the policies setup for e-waste management is sustained.
• Strengthened transnational cooperation to reduce the burden of large investments

The report concludes with detailed individual country profiles and elaborates on seven recommendations, headlined:

• Prevent more
• Be more aware
• Collect more
• Pollute less
• Pay adequately
• Work more safely, and
• Train more

* * * * *

About

Electrical and Electronic Equipment (EEE) encompasses all products powered by a battery or plug, including laptops, mobile phones, servers, fridges, washing machines, dishwashers, cooking and other kitchen appliances, many toys, and musical instruments. EEE is increasing rapidly, and spreading quickly in emerging sectors such as electric transport, clean energy production, and smart cities, which base their services on EEE and sensors.

The Regional E-waste Monitor for the CIS + Georgia is produced by the Sustainable Cycles (SCYCLE) Programmeco-hosted by the United Nations University (UNU) and the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR), in partnership with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

The project was funded by the German Federal Environment Ministry’s Advisory Assistance Programme (AAP) for environmental protection in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe, the Caucasus and Central Asia and other countries neighbouring the European Union. It was supervised by the German Environment Agency (UBA). Workshops during the project were co-funded by the International Telecommunication Union and the International Solid Waste Association and were co-organised by UNEP.

The German Environment Agency (Umweltbundesamt, UBA) is Germany’s central environmental authority. It employs more than 1,400 people at 13 locations. In addition to ‘purely scientific work’, the enforcement of environmental law – for example the Chemicals Act or the Plant Protection Act – and providing information to the general public about environmental protection issues are key areas of the agency‘s daily work. UBA is a partner and point of contact in Germany for a number of international institutions, for instance the World Health Organization (WHO) and the European Environment Agency.
www.umweltbundesamt.de/en

UBA supports the development of human resources and institutional capacities in the environmental sector in its partner countries in a variety of ways. The purpose of the Advisory Assistance Programme (AAP) is the exchange and transfer of knowledge and experience to the target region in order to strengthen environmental administration bodies, raise environmental standards and prepare for environmental investments. UNU’s and UNITAR’s project that provides the 1st regional e-waste report for Commonwealth of Independent States + Georgia fits ideally into these goals.
www.umweltbundesamt.de/en/advisory-assistance-programme

United Nations University (UNU) is an autonomous component of the UN General Assembly dedicated to generating and transferring knowledge and strengthening capacities relevant to global issues of human security, development, and welfare. The University
operates through a worldwide network of research and training centres and programmes, coordinated by the UNU Centre in Tokyo.
www.unu.edu

The United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR) is a dedicated training arm of the United Nations, with a mission of developing the individual, institutional, and organisational capacity of countries and other United Nations stakeholders through high quality learning solutions and related knowledge products and services as a means for enhancing global decision-making and providing support at the country level in overcoming global challenges.
www.unitar.org

The SCYCLE Programme, in transition from UNU to UNITAR, envisions enabling societies to reduce the environmental load from production, use, and disposal of ubiquitous goods, especially EEE, to sustainable levels by means of independent, comprehensive, and practical research and training, providing more thorough fact bases for policy development and decision making. SCYCLE leads the global e-waste research and related trainings, and advances sustainable e-waste management strategies based on life-cycle thinking.
www.scycle.info

* * * * *

Coverage highlights:

ТАSS, Russia, Количество электронных отходов на свалках СНГ за 10 лет выросло в полтора раза (The amount of e-waste in landfills in the CIS has grown by one and a half times over 10 years), click here

National Geographic Россия, Russia (1,061,937)
Объем электронных отходов на свалках СНГ стремительно растет, (The volume of e-waste in landfills in the CIS is growing rapidly), click here

IndoAsian News Service, India, (via ProKerala), E-waste in Commonwealth of Independent States rises 50% in decade, click here

腾讯网 (TenCent News), Mainland China, 年将10吨黄金当垃圾扔掉，这些国家正在造成巨大浪费 (Throwing away 10 tons of gold as garbage every year, these countries are causing huge waste), click here

Central Asia Media, Russia, Узбекистан среди лидеров в СНГ по количеству электронных отходов на свалках – исследование ООН, (Uzbekistan among CIS leaders in terms of the amount of e-waste in landfills – UN study), click here

Фергана, Russia, Казахстан и Узбекистан — в лидерах СНГ по объему электронных отходов на свалках (Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan are among the leaders of the CIS in terms of the volume of electronic waste in landfills), click here

Караван, Kazakhstan, ООН обратила внимание на проблему электронных отходов на свалках в Казахстане, (UN drew attention to the problem of e-waste in landfills in Kazakhstan), click here

Repost, Uzbekistan, За 10 лет количество электронных отходов на свалках СНГ выросло в 1,5 раза: большая их часть приходится на Россию, Украину, Казахстан и Узбекистан, (Over the past 10 years, the amount of electronic waste in landfills in the CIS has grown by 1.5 times: most of it comes from Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan), click here

Tashkent Times, Uzbekistan, Uzbekistan among leaders in e-waste in landfills in CIS, click here

Kant KG, Kyrgyzstan, ООН назвал Узбекистан одним из лидеров в СНГ по количеству электронных отходов на свалках (UN names Uzbekistan one of the leaders in the CIS in terms of the amount of electronic waste in landfills), click here

El Ágora, Spain, Asia central y el este de Europa, puntos negros de los desechos electrónicos (Central Asia and Eastern Europe, e-waste hot spots), click here

Full coverage summary, click here

News release in full, click here

The e-waste result of an online streaming explosion: an emerging concern / information gap

On International E-Waste Day 2021, leading experts and producer responsibility organisations are calling on households, businesses and governments to get behind efforts to get more dead or unused plug-in or battery-operated products to facilities where they can be either repaired or recycled to recover a king’s fortune in valuable materials and reduce the need for new resources.

This year’s worldwide mountain of waste electronic and electrical equipment (WEEE) will total an estimated 57.4 million tonnes — greater than the weight of the Great Wall of China, Earth’s heaviest artificial object.

Last year’s Global E-waste Monitor 2020 reported an estimated 53.6 million metric tonnes (Mt) of WEEE generated in 2019 — a 21% jump in the five years since 2014 (with e-waste on a predicted course to 74 Mt by 2030). 

Global e-waste generation is therefore growing annually by 2 Mt, or about 3 to 4%, a problem attributed to higher consumption rates of electronics (increasing 3% annually), shorter product lifecycles and limited repair options.

According to estimates in Europe, where the problem is best studied, 11 of 72 electronic items in an average household are no longer in use or are broken.  Annually per citizen, another 4 to 5 kg of unused electrical and electronic products are hoarded in Europe prior to being discarded. 

When it comes to mobile phones, a French study estimates that 54 to 113 million mobile phones alone, weighing 10 to 20 tonnes, are sleeping in drawers and other storage spaces in French homes.

In the US, while many mobile phones are recycled, an estimated 151 million or more phones a year — approximately 416,000 a day — are trashed and end up incinerated or landfilled, and that 40% of heavy metals in US landfills come from discarded electronics.

By weight, discarded big appliances such as stoves and refrigerators constitute the largest component of e-waste. These large appliances contain steel, copper and aluminium which makes them attractive to thieves. Despite concerted efforts by governments at many levels, this problem persists. Even in the EU, which has had comprehensive Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) legislation in place for nearly two decades, consisting of targets and legal responsibilities, the EU’s formal e-waste collection rate is 55% (2018). Huge progress has been made in the last 20 years, but member states still struggle to achieve the targets for many complex reasons, as documented by UNITAR and the Brussels-based WEEE Forum in a report, WEEE Flows study and vision.

Says Pascal Leroy, Director General of the WEEE Forum, the organisation behind International E-Waste Day: “Many factors play a role in making the electrical and electronics sector resource efficient and circular. For example, our member producer responsibility organisations collected and secured responsible recycling of 2.8 Mt of e-waste in 2020.  But one thing stands out: as long as citizens don’t return their used, broken gear, sell it, or donate it, we will need to continue mining all-new materials causing great environmental damage.”

“This year’s focus for International E-Waste Day is the crucial role each of us has in making circularity a reality for e-products. This is more important than ever as our Governments go into COP26 to discuss global action to reduce carbon emissions. Every tonne of WEEE recycled avoids around 2 tonnes of CO2 emissions. If we all do the right thing with our e-waste we help to reduce harmful CO2 emissions ”

Hoarding, and the failure to return EEE

Comments Virginijus Sinkevičius, EU Commissioner for Environment, Oceans and Fisheries: “E-waste is one of the fastest growing waste streams, in Europe and around the world. To change this trend we should not think of it as waste, but rather wasted opportunity as longer-lasting products would be massive savings not just for consumers, but in precious raw materials and CO2 emissions. At the Commission, we are working on new eco-design requirements for electronic devices, to increase durability and make them easier to repair. We also want consumers to have better information, so it’s easier to make a sustainable choice.” (Video: https://bit.ly/3mGe6qN)

When asked about recycling rates, members of the public estimate that 40-50% of e-waste is recycled (illustrated by interviews at https://bit.ly/3FtNPoj, available from 14 October). In fact, less than half that — 17.4% — was known to be properly treated and recycled in 2019.  

In the case of cell phones, tablets, computers and other small information technology products, many factors are thought to discourage recycling, including data security, product value, difficult-to-reach return points, and uncertainty about appropriate recycling, among others.

Says Ruediger Kuehr, Director of the SCYCLE Programme and Head of UNITAR’s Office in Bonn, the value of EEE components in the world’s ‘urban mines’ is enormous.

“A tonne of discarded mobile phones is richer in gold than a tonne of gold ore,” Dr. Kuehr points out. 

“Embedded in 1 million cell phones, for example, are 24 kg of gold, 16,000 kg of copper, 350 kg of silver, and 14 kg of palladium — resources that could be recovered and returned to the production cycle. And if we fail to recycle these materials, new supplies need to be mined, harming the environment.”  

“Moreover, the recovery of gold and other material from waste saves a lot of carbon dioxide emissions when compared with virgin metal mining,” says Kees Baldé, Senior Programme Officer of the UN University’s SCYCLE Programme.  

He adds that high-value, recoverable materials conservatively valued at US $57 billion — a sum greater than the Gross Domestic Product of most countries – were mostly dumped or burned in those parts of the world without extended producer responsibility legislation in 2019 rather than being collected for treatment and reuse.

Successfully raising collection rates requires every actor to be involved, including consumers.

“Alongside convenience, financial compensation, care for the environment, culture and social norms, awareness is one of the key motivators for people to take action on e-waste,” says Magdalena Charytanowicz of the WEEE Forum in charge of International E-Waste Day. 

“This is why on 14 October we hope to reach as many citizens worldwide as possible and urge the proper disposal of end-of-life electronics by encouraging campaigns and awareness activities such as e-waste collections, school lectures, and social media outreach. Even the smallest action promoting sound e-waste collection, repair, reuse or recycling is welcome in the frame of International E-Waste Day.”

“Consumers,” she adds, “want to do the right thing but need to be adequately informed and a convenient infrastructure should be easily available to them so that disposing of e-waste correctly becomes the social norm in communities.”

E-waste and the Internet: An information gap

An emerging dimension of the e-waste issue: rising world demand for data and digital services.

A recent European report (at https://bit.ly/3A9gzyC) says that “video on demand, movies, social media clips and game streaming take up close to 85% of the bandwidth of the data centres.”

Meanwhile, a 2020 joint ITU and WEEE Forum study (at https://bit.ly/3o5pRcz) underlines that digitalisation is needed to foster economic circularity.  It also includes several startling statistics. For example: 

• Internet users have doubled since 2010, traffic has grown approximately 30% annually, and by 2023 users worldwide will number 5.3 billion (66% of the world’s population).
• Mobile Internet users are projected to increase from 3.8 billion in 2019 to 5 billion by 2025 while IoT-connected devices will double from 12 billion to 25 billion in that same period.

All this and the dawning uses of cloud computing, 5G, self-driving cars, blockchain, machine learning and other areas of artificial intelligence require an ever-growing number of servers — millions of them in data centres.  

While this type of professional equipment for Internet connectivity certainly represents far less e-waste by weight than consumer devices, the report notes, there is very little hard data available — an information gap that needs to be filled.

Adds the report: “Smartphones continue to be at the centre of data use growth, as they generate most of the mobile data traffic (95% projected in 2025). Traffic growth is driven both by the rising number of smartphone subscriptions and increasing average data volume per subscription, fuelled primarily by higher resolution video content viewing.”

And product manufacturers have a major role to play alongside that of consumers. 

“Fast mobile phone development has led to a market dependency on rapid replacement of older devices. Mobile devices affect the environment in many ways over their lifetimes, but the impact can be reduced and spread over a longer period by applying circular economy principles, including production control, device reuse, remanufacture and recycling, and improved circular design involving component material selection, standardization and modularization for easier disassembly.”

* * * * *

About 

International e-Waste Day (#ewasteday)

Last year over 120 organisations from 50 countries worldwide supported the third International e-Waste Day observance. This year, the WEEE Forum and other organizers invite all organisations involved in effective and responsible e-waste management to plan awareness raising activities.

www.internationalewasteday.com 

The WEEE Forum 

The WEEE Forum is a Brussels-based for-impact, not-for-profit international association representing forty-five producer responsibility organisations across the globe. Together with our members, we are at the forefront of turning the extended producer responsibility principle into an effective electronic waste management policy approach through our combined knowledge of the technical, business and operational aspects of collection, logistics, de-pollution, processing, preparing for reuse and reporting of e-waste. It is the biggest organisation of its kind in the world. Our mission is to be the world’s foremost e-waste competence centre excelling in the implementation of the circularity principle. The PROs are based in Europe, the Americas, Africa, Oceania and Asia. In 2020, its member organisations reported collection and proper de-pollution and recycling of 2.8 Mt of WEEE. Website: www.weee-forum.org. Correspondence pascal.leroy@weee-forum.org 

* * * * *

Media coverage highlights:

News release in full: click here

Newswires

Associated Press Television Network, “International E-Waste Day: Recycling old washing machines,” click here

Reuters, via Daily Mail, United Kingdom (72,277,803), “It’s our stuff’: consumers wage right-to-repair revolution,” click here

Deutsche Presse Agentur, via Handelsblatt, Germany (6,697,360), “Höchstwert an Elektroschrott erwartet: Appell an Verbraucher,” click here

Austria Presse Agentur, Austria “57,4 Millionen Tonnen Elektroschrott erwartet” (57.4 million tons of electronic waste expected), click here

Agencia EFE, Spain, via El Tiempo, Colombia (13,299,771) Spanish version: “Basura electrónica en 2021 tendrá más peso que la Gran Muralla china,” click here; French: “La basura electrónica en 2021 tendrá más peso que la Gran Muralla china,” click here

Europa Press, Spain (6,673,251) “Hasta 57,4 millones de toneladas se producirán este 2021, el equivalente a la Gran Muralla China, según estimaciones,” click here

IndoAsian News Service, via ProKerala, India (10,953,240) “International E-Waste Day: Discarded cell phones richer in gold than ore,” click here

Athenian News Agency – Macedonian Agency, Greece “Τους 57,4 εκατ. τόνους θα φθάσουν τα παγκόσμια ηλεκτρονικά και ηλεκτρικά απόβλητα το 2021” (Global electronics and electrical waste to reach 57.4 million tonnes in 2021), click here

News sites

BBC, UK (31,011,679) “Waste electronics will weigh more than the Great Wall of China,” click here

The Independent, United Kingdom (44,598,029) “‘Mountain’ of electronic waste from this year alone will weigh as much as Great Wall of China, experts warn,” click here

Times Of India, India (27,536,472) “Asus announces #DiscardResposibily campaign for e-waste disposal,” click here

La Repubblica, Italy (23,274,270) “I rifiuti elettrici ed elettronici prodotti nell’ultimo anno pesano più della Grande Muraglia cinese,” click here

ABC News, Australia (21,879,584) “E-waste surges in 2021 as world sends goldmine to landfill,” click here

Gazeta, Poland (9,899,000) “NIE WYRZUCAJ ELEKTROŚMIECI DO ŚMIETNIKA. Nowy, ekologiczny mural w centrum Warszawy!”, click here

凤凰网, Mainland China (18,320,678) “今年人类将产生近6300万吨电子垃圾 价值约625亿美元,” click here

Environmental Health News, United States “Electronic waste from just this year will outweigh the Great Wall of China,” click here

Fast Company, United States (5,335,903) “The ‘mountain’ of electronics we discard in 2021 could weigh more than the Great Wall of China,” click here

Inverse, United States (10,548,685) “International E-Waste Day 2021: 6 shocking facts raise the alarm on a growing crisis,” click here

Tech Times, United States (1,280,915) “2021 E-Waste Surges at 57.4 Million Tons with Only 17.4% Recycled as Per 2019 Figures,” click here

Naked Scientists, UK, “E-waste recycling rates are alarmingly low,” click here

ORF, Austria (1,223,8580). “Elektromüllberg schwerer als Chinesische”
(Mountain of electrical waste heavier than the Great Wall of China), click here

India.com, via MSN हिंदी India, “International E-Waste Day: सोने-चांदी का खजाना है आपका मोबाइल फोन, जरूरत है तो बस”, click here

IT-Hallbarhet, Sweden, “International E-waste Day – Lämna in din uttjänta hemelektronik för återvinning,” click here

Liputan6, Indonesia (23,212,729) “Limbah Elektronik Tahun 2021 Capai 57,4 Juta Metrik Ton,” click here

VN Express, Viet Nam (12,721,405) “Rác điện tử năm 2021 nặng hơn Vạn lý Trường thành” (E-waste in 2021 is heavier than the Great Wall), click here

(Prachachat)ประชาชาติธุรกิจ, Thailand (3,808,425) “14 ต.ค. วันขยะอิเล็กทรอนิกส์สากล AIS ดึงน้องเทนนิส ปลุกกระแสรีไซเคิล” (October 14, International Electronic Waste Day, Awaken the recycling stream), click here

Portfolio, Hungary (3,251,250), “Idén a kínai nagy falnál is nagyobb tömegű lesz az elektronikus hulladék,” click here

Delfi, Lithuania (2,429,244), “Elektronikos atliekų drastiškai daugėja: šiemet jos svers daugiau nei Didžioji kinų siena,” click here

Full coverage summary, click here

Led by the World Resources Forum, consortium designates recycling, reuse of key elements in four electronic, electrical product categories as ‘critical’

End-of-life circuit boards, certain magnets in disc drives and electric vehicles, EV and other special battery types, and fluorescent lamps are among several electrical and electronic products containing critical raw materials (CRMs), the recycling of which should be made law, says a new UN-backed report funded by the EU.

A mandatory, legal requirement to recycle and reuse CRMs in select e-waste categories is needed to safeguard from supply disruptions elements essential to manufacturers of important electrical and electronic and other products, says a European consortium behind the report, led by the Switzerland-based World Resources Forum.

The CEWASTE consortium warns that access to the CRMs in these products is vulnerable to geo-political tides. Recycling and reusing them is “crucial” to secure ongoing supplies for regional manufacturing of electrical and electronic equipment (EEE) essential for defence, renewable energy generation, LEDs and other green technologies, and to the competitiveness of European firms.

Today, recycling most of the products rich in CRMs is not commercially viable, with low and volatile CRM prices undermining efforts to improve European CRM recycling rates, which today are close to zero in most cases.

The report (available post-embargo at cewaste.eu) identifies gaps in standards and proposes an improved, fully tested certification scheme to collect, transport, process and recycle this waste, including tools to audit compliance.

“A European Union legal framework and certification scheme, coupled with broad financial measures will foster the investments needed to make recycling critical raw materials more commercially viable and Europe less reliant on outside supply sources,” says the consortium.

“Acceptance by the manufacturing and recycling industry is also needed, as the standards will only work when there is widespread adoption.”

The report follows the 2020 EU action plan to make Europe less dependent on third countries for CRMs by, for example, diversifying supply from both primary and secondary sources while improving resource efficiency and circularity.

Adds the consortium: “By adopting this report’s recommendations, the EU can be more self-sustaining, help drive the world’s green agenda and create new business opportunities at home.”

The project says the following equipment categories contain CRMs in concentrations high enough to facilitate recycling:

• Printed circuit boards from IT equipment, hard disc drives and optical disc drives
• Batteries from WEEE and end of life vehicles
• Neodymium iron boron magnets from hard disc drives, and electrical engines of e-bikes, scooters and end-of-life vehicles (ELVs)
• Fluorescent powders from cathode ray tubes (CRTs; in TVs and monitors) and fluorescent lamps

Recovery technologies and processes are well established for some CRMs, such as palladium from printed circuit boards or cobalt from lithium-ion batteries.

For other CRMs, ongoing recycling technology development will soon make industrial scale operations possible but needs financial support and sufficient volumes to achieve cost-efficient operations.

Of 60+ requirements in European e-waste-related legislation and standards, few address the collection of CRMs in the key product categories, the consortium found.

They propose several additional technical, managerial, environmental, social and traceability requirements for facilities that collect, transport, and treat waste, for integration into established standards, such as the EU 50625-series.

The overall scheme was tested at European firms in Belgium, Italy, Portugal, Spain and Switzerland, as well as in Colombia, Rwanda and Turkey.

“Greater CRM recycling is a society-wide responsibility and challenge,” says the consortium. “The relevant authorities must improve the economic framework conditions to make it economically viable.”

CEWASTE project recommendations include:

• Legislate a requirement to recycle specific critical raw materials in e-waste
• Use market incentives to spur the economic viability of recovering CRMs and to stimulate the use of recovered CRMs in new products
• Create platforms where demand for recycled components, materials and CRMs can meet supply
• Raise awareness of the importance of CRM recycling
• Consolidate fractions of CRM-rich products into quantities more attractive for recyclers
• Improve access to information on CRM-rich components and monitor actual recycling
• Enforce rules around shipment of CRM-rich fractions outside the EU and respect of technical standards along the value chain
• Integrate CEWASTE norms and requirements into the European standard for e-waste treatment (EN 50625 series) and make the whole set legally binding
• Support more targeted private investments in new technology research and development.

###

Media coverage highlights

The Guardian, United Kingdom
Insufficient recycling of rare metals could hinder climate efforts, experts warn https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/may/10/recycling-rare-metals-climate-green-technology

Agence France Presse, France
E-waste recycling matter of national security: report
https://news.yahoo.com/e-waste-recycling-matter-national-164642886.html
French: Le recyclage des e-déchets est un enjeu de sécurité nationale: rapport
https://yourtopia.fr/le-recyclage-des-e-dechets-est-un-enjeu-de-securite-nationale-rapport-france-24/

BBC, United Kingdom
Urgent calls for mandatory recycling of e-waste
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w3ct1lrz

TASS, Russia
Эксперты: переработку электронных отходов в ЕС должен регулировать специальный закон https://tass.ru/ekonomika/11334269

New Scientist, United Kingdom
The EU may make recycling e-waste a legal requirement – will it work?
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2277074-the-eu-may-make-recycling-e-waste-a-legal-requirement-will-it-work/

Yahoo! News, United States
Recycling tech ‘should be mandatory’ due to rare earth metals
https://news.yahoo.com/recycling-mandatory-155934304.html

Indo Asian News Service, India
Law Required For Recycling of EVs, Electric Equipment Having Critical Raw Materials: UN-Backed Report
https://www.news18.com/news/auto/law-required-for-recycling-of-evs-electric-equipment-having-critical-raw-materials-un-backed-report-3726527.html

Público, Spain
Residuos electrónicos Móviles, ordenadores y baterías contienen metales estratégicos para Europa que los expertos recomiendan recuperar
https://www.publico.es/ciencias/residuos-electronicos-moviles-ordenadores-baterias-contienen-metales-estrategicos-europa-hay-recuperar-avisan-expertos.html

HLN, Belgium
Experts vragen verplichte recyclage van zeldzame aardmetalen uit vrees voor tekorten https://www.hln.be/wetenschap-en-planeet/experts-vragen-verplichte-recyclage-van-zeldzame-aardmetalen-uit-vrees-voor-tekorten~a451065a/

Metals Recycling World, United Kingdom
Compulsory recycling urged for rare materials
https://www.mrw.co.uk/news/compulsory-recycling-urged-for-rare-materials-10-05-2021/

Tisen TV, Czech Republic
Recyklujte důležité kovy v elektronickém odpadu: Učiňte to zákonem, varují odborníci z Evropské unie a citují zabezpečení surovin
https://www.tisen.tv/recyklujte-dulezite-kovy-v-elektronickem-odpadu-ucinte-to-zakonem-varuji-odbornici-z-evropske-unie-a-cituji-zabezpeceni-surovin/

Kmetro, Italy
Rifiuti elettronici: Rapporto CEWASTE, il riciclaggio è una
https://kmetro0.it/2021/05/11/rifiuti-elettronici-rapporto-cewaste-il-riciclaggio-e-una-questione-di-sicurezza-nazionale/

Vietnam+, Viet Nam
Tái chế rác thải điện tử đóng vai trò quan trọng với an ninh châu Âu
https://www.vietnamplus.vn/tai-che-rac-thai-dien-tu-dong-vai-tro-quan-trong-voi-an-ninh-chau-au/711860.vnp

UrduPoint Network, Pakistan
E-waste Recycling Matter Of National Security: Report
https://www.urdupoint.com/en/world/e-waste-recycling-matter-of-national-security-1247456.html

Homeland Security News Wire, United States
Critical materialsE-Waste and National Security
http://www.homelandsecuritynewswire.com/dr20210510-ewaste-and-national-security

Newspapers in print

The Guardian (USA) 11 May 2021 Page: 13

News release in full, click here

Full coverage summary, click here

Geneva, Thursday 18 March 2021 – Today, top electronics companies, together with a group of pioneering global organizations, set a vision and roadmap committing to a circular economy for electronics by 2030. These companies include some of the world’s largest consumer brands and represent nearly $6 trillion total market cap.

The global Circular Electronics Partnership (CEP) marks the first time experts, business leaders and global organizations will co-design solutions around this topic. This pre-competitive industry platform will establish a network of networks to elevate the action and ambition of the industry in a coordinated way.

E-waste is currently the fastest-growing waste stream in the world, one estimated at nearly 50 million tons. Research finds that only 17.4% of e-waste is collected and recycled. This waste is worth at least $57 billion annually, more than the GDPs of many countries, offering a unique opportunity for economic growth and resilience if handled correctly.

Extensive stakeholder collaboration is required to maximize this opportunity – and simultaneously create the systems-wide changes needed for true impact and sustainability.

CEP’s vision will maximize the value of components, products and materials through their full lifecycles using safe and fair labor and depending on only circular resources. These shifts will generate economic value while creating social and environmental impact.

This multi-stakeholder partnership will translate commitments into immediate actions, such as:

• Defining circular electronic product and services
• Mobilizing a global, sustainable and circular procurement commitment
• Developing a responsible recycling and circular material data system
• Piloting two material track and trace projects
• Commercial financing mechanisms for increased collection

Along with the partnership, the group announces the launch of an action road map. This document, endorsed by business leaders and experts, identifies six pathways to circularity. The roadmap, released today, focuses on different stages of the value chain to help businesses and partner organizations overcome barriers to circularity.

“There’s no time to waste in finding sustainable solutions for consumption and production,” says Dominic Waughray, Managing Director, World Economic Forum. “The roadmap and vision set forth by the Circular Electronics Partnership will create the necessary momentum to maximize resources, transform value chains and make the circular transition in electronics a reality.”

Collaborators within the electronics industry include Cisco, Close the Loop, Dell Technologies, Glencore, Google, KPMG International, Lanxess, Microsoft, Security Matters, Sims Limited and Vodafone.

The companies have been brought together by a new alliance of convening organizations that include: Global Electronics Council (GEC), Global Enabling Sustainability Initiative (GeSI), Platform for Accelerating the Circular Economy (PACE), Responsible Business Alliance (RBA), World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), and the World Economic Forum (WEF).

The vision and roadmap were developed in collaboration with other stakeholders, including the International Telecommunication Union (ITU).

As electronics are omnipresent, a new approach is critical, says Peter Bakker, President and CEO, World Business Council and Sustainable Development. “Far beyond just computers, monitors and phones, electronics are commonly found in everything from clothing to toys.

As applications scale, they should be circular in design, production, use and recovery to create a nature, climate and people positive value chain.

The Circular Electronics Partnership embodies this ambition, he adds, and can serve as the center of gravity for this transition. “WBCSD is proud to host the CEP and we look forward to implementing the Roadmap with our Partners and the biggest companies in electronics.”

Industry partners look forward to working together to find solutions.

“Since creating our first OptiPlex desktop with recycled plastic in 2007 we have been on a mission to drive innovative approaches to accelerate the circular economy. It’s why we set an ambitious goal to get to 50% recycled or renewable materials across our entire product portfolio by 2030,” said Michael Murphy, Vice President, Product Development Engineering at Dell Technologies.

“But as an industry, we need to move faster. Which is why the Circular Electronics Partnership is so important – to drive collaboration and eliminate roadblocks to make bigger strides in circularity.”

###

Coverage highlights

Agence France Presse, Big Tech backs plan to tackle e-waste crisis, click here

COSMOS Magazine, Australia, Can a circular economy eliminate e-waste?

Environmental Leader, United States, Dell, Google, Others Join New Electronics Partnership to Develop Circular Economy

LifeGate, Italy Le big dell’elettronica stringono la loro prima alleanza per l’economia circolare

TyN Magazine, Argentina, Principales marcas de electrónica lanzan la primera alianza del sector privado para la electrónica circular (Leading Electronics Brands Launch First Private Sector Alliance for Circular Electronics)

华强北电脑网 (Huaqiangbei Computer Network), Mainland China, Big Tech支持解决电子垃圾危机的计划 (Big Tech supports the plan to solve the e-waste crisis)

45 Seconds, France, Dell, Microsoft, Google et d’autres entreprises technologiques se joignent à une initiative pour s’attaquer aux problèmes des déchets électroniques (Dell, Microsoft, Google, and other tech companies join initiative to tackle e-waste issues)

Full coverage highlights, click here

News release in full, click here