The Environmental Cost of Silicon Chips

Col. Panic writes "Scientific American is running a small story about the amount of material required to produce silicon chips and the potential hazards of associated toxic chemicals." This combined with coltan mining processes sure paints a dark picture of the chip industry.

Comments

At least get the words right.. ok?

[nurb432]

Umm that's Silicone..

One of my pet peeves, when people mis-pronounce it, saying silicone when they mean silicon..

and...

[RebelTycoon]

Imagine how expensive computers would be without it.

The environmental impact is high because the countries that are either being mined or being dumped in (China) have low or non-existent environmental controls.

Don't blame the industry when countries don't stand up to corporations. In the case of Africa and the mining there, I think a little toughness on American and other foreign corporations would go a long way. But as long as those governments are corrupt and willing to take bribes over protecting their people, such is life.

In China, the government has taken steps to help solve the mess, but it will take time. For China, I'm suprised they aren't using prisoners to forage the components... But I guess that's because they need their organs to harvest, and lead contamination lowers their value on the black market.