Table of Contents
What is E-waste?
You must be familiar with the term e-waste or digital garbage. It is used to define electronic devices that are now unusable. This may be because they are broken, not relevant anymore, or have served their lifespan. E-waste is one of the major environmental concerns in today’s world. With the huge leaps we are taking in technology, e-waste is becoming a growing concern.
When an electronic device is discarded into the environment, it takes a long time to decompose. This time is often a few million years. During this time, when it interacts with other substances and sunlight, toxic chemicals like beryllium, cadmium, lead, mercury, and others are released that can poison the water bodies or land around it. This makes the place inhabitable for local life. Plants and sea life are affected as well.
Depending on the circumstances, this process can take a few years, weeks, days, or even hours. But in any period, the effects are deadly whenever an electronic device is improperly disposed of in the environment.
How E-waste gets introduced into the environment:
There are several ways e-waste can get introduced into the environment. It can depend upon the nature of the e-waste, its usage, and how advanced it is.
- Leftover Tech:
Most of the e-waste is from technology that was new at one time but is obsolete now. Radios, tape recorders, floppy disks, and other outdated tech is of no value today. Hence it is thrown into the garbage and goes everywhere that garbage goes.
Wherever this ends up, it starts to interact with the immediate environment and release myriad toxins, resulting in pollution.
- Landfill:
When e-waste makes its way to landfills and garbage buried in the ground, harmful chemicals can leach into the soil and toxify it. These absorbed toxins can be especially harmful if they manage to reach the groundwater.
- Into the water:
Disposed e-waste can find its way to water bodies, like lakes, ponds, streams, and rivers. This can poison the water and affect not only the fish and aquatic life but also the land organisms drinking the compromised water without having any idea about the contamination.
- Mining:
We depend on gold, copper, and some trace elements to create electronic devices. When these materials are mined out of the ground, many toxic chemicals are produced as by-products. For example, cyanide and mercury are the by-products of gold mining. These can severely pollute water bodies near the mining site and the land around it.
E-waste can be of many different types based on many factors. A general list includes:
| Household appliances | Communication devices | Entertainment utilities | Electronic gadgets | Office and healthcare equipment |
| Microwaves | Smartphones | Blu Ray players | Massage Chairs | Servers |
| Ovens | Desktop PC | Soundbars | Remote controls | Cables/cords |
| Electric stoves | Laptops | Stereos | Lamps | Dialysis machines |
| Electric heaters | Circuit boards | TVs | Treadmills | Wi-fi dongles |
| Fans | RAMs | Gaming systems | Smartwatches | Power supplies |
| Vacuum cleaner | Hard drives | Fax machines | Fitbit | X-ray machines |
| Juicers/mixers | Chargers | Printers | Autoclave |
How to reduce and recycle different types of e-waste:
The question of how to avoid the harmful effects of e-waste can be answered by e-waste recycling. It is a process whereby electronic garbage is processed in a way that renders it less to not harmful at all.
Electronic devices can be broken down to utilize their components or to make new devices. . In any case, recycling drastically reduces risks to the environment posed by e-waste.
Today, the popularity of e-waste recycling is growing to preserve human and environmental health, mostly due to the strong polluting effects of e-waste. Here’s how the recycling process is carried out:
Step 1: Collection and transportation
This is the first step in the e-waste recycling process. Recyclers set up take-back booths or collecting bins in key positions. When these containers are full, recyclers take the e-waste to recycling factories and facilities.
Step 2: Shredding and sorting
The next stage is to shred and sort the e-waste after it has been collected and transported. Shredding is crucial to the effectiveness of subsequent separation.
Shredding breaks down the electronic waste into smaller pieces so that it can be properly sorted. These small pieces are carefully sorted and deconstructed by hand. This is often time-consuming since waste materials must be sorted at this point to salvage distinct sections.
The materials are then split into core materials and components. These things are then classified into numerous groups. Items that can be reused as is and those that require additional recycling processes are separated.
Step 3: Dust extraction
The tiny waste particles are evenly distributed on the conveyor belt thanks to a shaking action.
The e-waste fragments that have been evenly distributed are then broken down even more. The dust is extracted and disposed of environmentally friendly at this point. There is no environmental degradation in this manner.
Step 4: Magnetic separation
Following that, a powerful overhead magnet aids in the separation of steel and iron from other wastes. You have effectively recycled the steel from the waste stream in this manner.
Separating circuit boards, copper, and aluminum from other waste particles may necessitate some mechanical operations. This is especially true where they are primarily made of plastic.
Step 5: Water separation
technology is then used to separate the glass from the plastic.
Glass-containing materials can then be sent to smelters to be used in the manufacture of batteries, x-ray tubes, and new CRTs.
Step 6: Purification of the waste stream
is purified further by locating and extracting the leftover materials.
What can we do to reduce e-waste?
After the material goes through the recycling process, we have already rendered it harmless to the environment and have separated all its components into separate categories. Though this process is effective, a better approach to managing e-waste is by not creating it in the first place. We can all take the following steps to ensure control of e-waste at an individual level:
- Limit Excessive Buying
We are all guilty of indulging in needless purchasing from time to time. The problem is not controlling our impulses to a level where we start contributing too much to the e-waste being generated around us. We have little or no need to buy electronics, which means they’ll end up in a landfill or garbage somewhere and will contribute to environmental pollution. A better approach is to be hesitant about buying anything we have little or no need for, especially when it comes to electronics and technology.
A general rule of thumb can come from the stoic philosophy. Stoics believe in being ruthless to everything that doesn’t matter. This involves things we want to buy but have no need for. Once we understand the temporary impulse or urge we are feeling, we can learn to control it.
- Donate to Charity:
Many of our electronics end up in the garbage because we can’t quite see a use for them anymore. But, instead of just disposing of them somewhere, if we donated such items to charity, we may help people who can’t afford such items.
Things that have lived their useful life for us, or things we have found better alternatives for, all can go to the people in need instead of ending up in garbage somewhere. This will reduce e-waste and improve life for so many people living under the line of poverty and have no resources to afford even the most basic things for a modern lifestyle.
- Go Green:
Green living and green technology are slowly starting to become a revolution. People are starting to understand the need for electronic gadgets and equipment that have little or no impact on the environment once disposed of. Hence, green technology must be our priority when purchasing new electronic items.
As the world progresses, we are starting to turn towards electronics more than the physical. This means going paperless in our workplaces, relying on doing things the modern way as much as we can.
One such example could be found in the use of rechargeable calling cards by Talk Home, a UK-based MVNO that is changing telecom for the better. Unlike the traditional, physical calling cards, these are e-cards that you can buy online, use with a PIN, and after they expire, recharge them right from your digital wallet.
The same company has introduced the Talk Home App; not only does it replace the traditional SIM cards that contribute to e-waste after being discarded, but it also offers amazingly cheap rates and connects you to any part of the world using local lines in the area. Hence, you can connect to areas where there’s no internet available without having to contribute to the rising amounts of SIM garbage.
- Find Recycling Stores:
Instead of throwing unwanted electronics away, you can consider giving them to recycling stores. All you need to do is to drop off the electronics at your nearest store, and they will take care of the rest.
The devices will go through a rigorous recycling process like the one mentioned above, and any components that can be recycled or reused will be collected. This will ensure the impact of those devices is not negative on the environment.
The best part of recycling booths and stores is that they will ensure your electronic garbage doesn’t end up in a landfill or near a water body to contaminate and pollute the soil and the drinking water around the area.
So, next time we have electronic garbage to get rid of, we should look for these recycling stores or booths instead of just throwing them away.
The increasing digital garbage has been a major concern in the UK. The first official notice was taken in 2003. Since then, several steps have been taken to ensure the impact of e-waste remains minimal on the environment and the safety of the citizens.
Laws were made in 2010, 2014, and 2019 to effectively counter the increasing risks posed by the rising levels of e-waste around Europe.
A detailed account of the e-waste situation in Europe and how it is being handled can be found here.
Conclusion:
The technological advancement we are witnessing in the world of today means we will be making huge leaps towards a digitally connected life. This will ultimately increase our reliance on electronic devices, and new technologies will keep replacing old ones.
To sum up, we are on our way to producing more e-waste than ever before. If we are not managing the ever-increasing e-waste, we will find our environment in peril very soon.
Going green, recycling and reusing is the way toward the future. Using and discarding technology responsibly is the only way we can make sure the coming generations will not have their environment destroyed by pollution and their drinking water contaminated by pollutants from digital garbage.
In this regard, everyone amongst us has a role to play, and we must not hesitate to play it.
