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Mandatory Hardware Recycling Coming To US?
BDPrime writes, "A U.S. congressional caucus has met twice to discuss proposing national legislation that would make hardware manufacturers responsible for taking back their own stuff, similar to what Europe implemented with WEEE (PDF). The story quotes David Douglas, one of Sun's eco-evangelists, reflecting on the alternative: 'If we were having to deal with local regulations and local disposition facilities in every state, to deal with every state's nuanced costs, that would clearly involve cost to our basic equipment.'" It's early days for this movement; the buzzword to watch here is "E-waste."
Why don't we place the same requirements on the appliance and automotive industries?
Oh, they probably have better lobyists, don't they?
If I sell something, it then belongs to you: you are responsible for its maintenance, use, and disposal, unless otherwise specified in a contract.
When the law starts saying I'm responsible for anything happens to an object I've sold in the future, where does it end? How about people being responsible for their own property?
Not that this effects apartment dwellers. I see TVs, radio, computers, computer monitors, used engine oil... all sorts of stuff in our apartment complexes dumpster. I can't imagine how Rhos is going to effect the end-users (corps have to follow the law, peeps just hide) unless we the consumer can dispose properly of our parts for less effort than it takes to walk down to the dumpster at 11pm. The only reason i recycle my HP ink cartridges is because they include than handy prepaid envelope to send it back - less effort to just put it in the outgoing mail bin, then take it down to the trash.
The article doesn't make this clear. If it only applies to domestically produced electronics, watch how fast the remainder of non-defence production gets moved overseas.
Luke, help me take this mask off
What makes the e-industry e-worse is that there is no practical use for many junked items. Sure, you can reuse the aluminium etc, but there's so little for the amount of work involved in stripping it. Car bodies can be recycled quite easily because there's lots of metal for relatively little effort.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
I think the biggest thing in the coming years (if not already) will be what to do with CRT monitors that are being replaced with LCD and other tech. Seems only this past week I've had several people ask me if want some 17" CRT's cuz they just upgraded to flat panals.
What about smaller computer shops? Surely to god a three person shop which assembles the computers themselves won't be able to implement a recycling program.
At which point, are they exempt due to some threshold? Or does this get extended to the component manufacturers?
It's good in principal, but there could be quite a few which fall through the cracks. (Not that we should abandon an attempt to prevent most of the computers from going into the landfill because a few smaller players won't be able to do it.)
Cheers
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
I have a machine with a Proliant Main and back plane
It has IBM SCSII Hard Drives
Its RAM is from who knows where
Its Nic's... 3-COM, Intel, Winbond
It's Fans... Who knows
Who do I send it back to?
Or do I have to break it into its pieces and send it all back where it came from.
What If I want to keep it forever?
I still have my Northstar (and yes it still works)
I have 4 meg sims (actually sold 3 today to a client for the printer)
-- I am the NRA, enough said...
It sounds to me like kdawson doesn't know the enlightenment topic refers to a window manager, and instead uses it in the cultural (education, spread of knowledge) sense.
I don't buy PCs off the shelf. So, if I decide to chuck an obsolete machine, who do I send it back to? I bought the parts from half a dozen manufacturers. Am I supposed to disassemble the thing and scatter the parts to the far corners of the world like the limbs of a traitor? Hell, I have no idea who manufactured the case, and they're in Taiwan or India or something. How do I solve this dilemma, Batman?
Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.
I think you are correct. Unfortunately, every time I get excited that there is some great e17 breakthrough but then I read the byline. It seems that some of the "new" folk just don't know what the Enlightenment, Digital (another commonly misused symbol), etc icons mean. It's sad really...
I'd personally love to see something like this go into effect, so long as the "recycling" doesn't involve shipping the toxic parts to 3rd world countries. However, there are a lot of us here in the US that can't really "lift" some of the older generation hardware (such as CRT displays). So why not impliment a system where you can schedule a pick-up of old hardware to be taken to one of these recycling facilities? (Maybe even for a small fee to be paid at the time of pick-up.)
If people had the option to have their useless electronic hardware hauled away instead of trying to transport it all themselves, I think hardware recycling could really take off here in the U.S. It's really just a matter of making it accessible to those of us who don't have the physical strength to move such items, or simply making it more appealing to the lazier parts of the population.
8==8 Bones 8==8
I'm sure that you are familiar with the Commerce Clause, and how it has traditionally given congress the power to do things like this, so I won't bore you with that. I will say that it makes sense to invoke the commerce clause whenever there is a decent one-size-fits-all solution to a problem in the country - especially in economic matters. It simply does not make sense to rely on every state (or God forbid, local) government to enact thousands of laws concerning hazardous waste. It becomes very expensive for any company to navigate all of these laws, and provides little or no benefit to the population. A national waste disposal policy does make sense, as long as it is well thought out and provides exceptions where needed.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Why don't we place the same requirements on the appliance and automotive industries?
Wehere I live, we ALREADY have mandatory recycling for refrigerators and freezers (by law they MUST be taken to an approved disposal facility--and all of those facilities recover the refrigerant and have the rest of the appliance recycled). As for other large appliances, recycling is not mandatory but they are virtually all recycled at the end of their useful lives already so it makes no sense to waste time legislating it.
Automotive industry recycling is the same here as well--used oil must be disposed of at apporved facilities by law, and those facilities almost universally recycle this oil. When we purchase new tires here we have to pay a "recycling fee" similar to paying a deposit on softdrink containers (though the consumer never gets that fee back....hmmm). There are few laws mandating automotive recycling however it is almost universally practised already. When you go to a parts store you always get credit for "core exchange" when you turn in the old/broken part. Nearly 100 percent of some parts are now recycled (starters, alternators, water pumps and so on).
So I don't know what box you've been hiding in but the appliance and automotive industries (ESPECIALLY the latter) are pioneers in recycling. In fact automobiles are one of (if not the most) extensively recycled items in the world. There is not only an automotive industry, but a very large AUTOMOTIVE RECYCLING industry. And guess what? They have very good lobbyists too! In fact, the automotive recycling lobbyists have managed to successfully out-lobby the automobile manufacturers lobbyists on a few occasions! I recall a case where one of the big 3 carmakers (can't remember if it was Ford, GM or Chrysler) was lobbying for regulations that would make it tougher to recycle or provide aftermarket parts (kinda like Lexmark trying to shut down ink cartridge refillers). Of course, this would hurt auto wreckers and aftermarket parts makers so their lobbyists fought back. The recyclers one that battle.