British Columbia To Charge Recycling Fee

An anonymous reader writes "Next week the province of British Columbia will begin adding a recycling fee to new computers and TVs to pay for their free electronics recycling program. The list of what is acceptable for recycling is short, namely computers, printers, and TVs — you cannot recycle personal audio players or cell phones. What is unclear is whether the definition of 'desktop computer' includes self-built computers, and if so, their plans for adding fees for individual components such as motherboards, etc." The article notes that the recovered e-waste will not be sent to developing countries for processing. But one report says that the e-waste won't be recycled at all, but rather burned in a smelter.

Comments

Huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

Next week the province of British Columbia will begin adding a RECYCLING FEE to new computers and TVs to pay for their FREE electronics recycling program.

Re:Huh?

[XanC]

It's called Michael Moore logic. If the government provides it, it's by definition "free".

Re:Huh?

[iknownuttin]

It's called Michael Moore logic. If the government provides it, it's by definition "free".

I don't know about Moore (I've only seen "Roger and Me" and "9/11"), but many people have that same logic. I hear it all the time and when you try to explain to them that you really do pay for it from your tax dollars, they give this look that I can only explain by an example:
Go to a dairy farm and start talking to a cow. That's the look you get.

They are also the same folks who think that when they get a Federal Tax refund that they didn't pay taxes for that year.
Really, there are people out there who believe that! I thought it was just rhetoric from pundits, but it's true.

Re:Huh?

[Zironic]

People in general are very bad at calculating real cost. It's the same with "Free extras" that you get with many products. People don't realize they've actually paid for those things.

Re:Huh?

[SnapShot]

Good point, calling the recycling program "free" is incorrect. In this case it would be better to call it a deposit on the proper disposal of your electronics. If that $2000 you just spent on your laptop doesn't include the cost to dispose of it then you're basically just assuming welfare from your fellow citizens and/or your descendants to cover the cost of its disposal and cleanup.

Re:Huh?

[Ohreally_factor]

Exactly. What is important about this change is not the mis-use of the word "free", but the shifting of the burden to the purchaser, rather than to the tax payer. That's good policy. A tax funded system is better than nothing and in some cases it's necessary to do it this way, but on the whole, it's better to shift the burden to the purchaser/user. Also good policy is to not shift the burden to the recycler, who you are trying to encourage, not penalize.

The one troubling thing is about how they plan on disposing of the waste. A smelter? He who smelter, dealter.

Re:Huh?

[Tatarize]

Well, he says it's free because you don't have to pay and it's cheaper than what we're paying now. If you look, the US pays more for healthcare than anybody and we receive not only bad service but significantly less service than we could if the services themselves were paid for rather than giving lots of money to insurance companies, whose best interest is served by letting you die.

Re:Huh?

[Millenniumman]

you don't have to pay Yes, you do. Maybe less on average, but you still pay.

Re:Huh?

[ChameleonDave]

It's called Michael Moore logic. If the government provides it, it's by definition "free".

No, you right-wing retard, it is called common sense. If the government or anyone else provides it for no charge, it is by definition free. Mentioning that a good or service is free to the person receiving it does not imply that the good or service materialised out of thin air or is not paid for at some other point along the chain.

If you stop me in the street and ask me for directions, and I help you out without asking for a fee in return, I am giving you a free service. It is irrelevant that you as a consumer or a taxpayer are part of a system that has, for example, provided us with streets to talk about, or which has provided me with healthcare to be able to be there. It is also free even if I decide I will only grant these requests if other people have similarly helped me out.

If walk into a hospital and am treated without being asked for money, then this is free of charge for me, even though the doctors are paid, and even though I am part of the system that funds all such public benefits.

Now, if I tell you that I'll give you directions "for free" if you let me sell you the newspaper I'm holding, then I am bundling together two products so tightly that it is dishonest to call either of them "free". This is common (dishonest) practice in marketing, but not what we are talking about here.

All of this is elementary, and should only need to be explained to people learning English as a foreign language, and needing to know how what "free of charge" means. It is sad that some wankers deliberately abuse language either to sell products or to work against essential services being provided to the people.

Re:Huh?

[Mistlefoot]

"The one troubling thing is about how they plan on disposing of the waste."

Yeah. Destroy it.

I still use an older Compaq laptop (333mhz, 128mb of Ram) as a web server for a not very busy local sports league. It runs an Ubuntu lamp install and has a phpbb forum and about 100 unique visitors per day. Speed of the machine is never an issue.

I also use another old Compaq (233mhz, 192mb of Ram) as a web browsing machine. It's also useful for updating the webserver as all my code I change is done via text editors. When my main machine is being used for gaming or what-not this older machine always handles the browsing, email, or chatting fine.

My 70 year old father has another old machine - a P3 that he uses to print PDF's (horse racing forms). He does nothing else with it. He never touches it. I VNC in and output the PDF's to his printer every Friday.

I would be more than happy to see older machines recycled if that's what actually happens. Ever price 128mb or 256mb PC100 ram lately? I imagine it being destroyed instead of actually being recycled.

If machines were actually dropped off and dated and they allowed people to scavenge (even at a fee) and take what's good I'd like this more. Once a PC has been there for, oh, a week or two and no ones taken it's parts then destroy it. Because something is old doesn't mean it has no use. I would love to work at this recycling place because if it is like the other dumps in the area they would rather destroy stuff then let you take it - liability seems to be the reason........

Recycling should mean recycling, not destroying, but I suspect that not very much recycling will go on.

Re:Huh?

[rumblin'rabbit]

Same thing with insurance. They tack on all sorts of benefits you don't want, and when you ask for the paired-down version they tell you that you may as well take them cause they're "free".

Doubling the benefits if I die by accident is a good example. It's utterly beyond me why I would want that, yet sure in hell it costs me money.

Re:Huh?

[Graff]

If the government or anyone else provides it for no charge, it is by definition free. If the government is providing something for "no charge" then they probably already charged you for it through your taxes. Just because you didn't explicitly pay for it that doesn't mean that you got it for free.

Re:Huh?

[_Mustang]

No, you right-wing retard, it is called common sense. If the government or anyone else provides it for no charge, it is by definition free. Mentioning that a good or service is free to the person receiving it does not imply that the good or service materialised out of thin air or is not paid for at some other point along the chain. I'm not trying to be inflammatory but frankly, with that kind of argument it seems you're more likely the retard than he.
You clearly have forgotten the purpose of government and the manner in which it is supposed to go about doing that purpose.
The basic premise of government is to form a collective which is empowered by "people" to run certain affairs on their behalf, right? And the manner of providing funding is typically through control of the land/air/sea/etc resources and of late - taxation and more taxation. That means that anything, ANYTHING for which tax moneys and government revenues were applied are paid services. Garbage collection, road work or that trip to the hospital - as long as I've paid my taxes then I've paid for those services. Kinda reminds me of my cell phone plan - they charge me for service monthly but I'm always invoiced a month ahead.. That means they have my cash in hand for a month before it is applied to the services it was billed as. And if I use less time you can be sure they do not credit me but heaven help me if I should go over my air-time allowances .
And don't get me started about road and infrastructure. Canadian gas has 50% tax added to the price under laws which speak of road and highway maintenance and such but which conveniently allows for the cash to go into general coffers rather than a road-related account system.

Oh - I checked http//dictionary.com and the most closely related definitions to this thread, of the word "free":
(Not ordered)
1. exempt or released from something specified that controls, restrains, burdens, etc. (usually fol. by from or of): free from worry; free of taxes.
2. provided without, or not subject to, a charge or payment: free parking; a free sample.
3. given without consideration of a return or reward: a free offer of legal advice.

Hmm, so far we're not doing so well. It is common record that if you don't pay your taxes then hello jail cell, and since taxes are the primary source of funding for government projects - number 1 clearly does not apply.
Well, they want a service charge added to fund this above and beyond the basic taxes I already pay - so number 2 is out.
As for number 3 - when was the last time any forward-looking project was undertaken by government without the idea of winning votes? I can't recall any instance of that.

So I see nothing here but proof of the old adage, "ain't no such thing as a free lunch"..

Re:Huh?

[mrbcs]

Here in Alberta, we call it Advance Disposal Surcharge. When you buy a new computer, tv etc, you get charged a fee to dispose of it later. This is brilliant. The stations will accept any electronics for free right now. This keeps all the old shit that hadn't had a surcharge charged, from the landfills. (payment of surcharge is not a pre-requisite to dispose of old equipment)

The collection stations then ship all this electronics to Calgary or Edmonton to be processed. (sometimes, if you work there or know someone there they will let you scavenge)Machines that are still viable are resold to computer dealers like me to be re-used.

Machines that are too old are stripped and the components are sent to the proper place to be recycled. Plastics get melted down, metals get smelted out etc. No, the system is not perfect, but it keeps the old tv's and computers out of our land fills.

Hopefully B.C. isn't re-inventing the wheel and they will have a similar system.

Re:Huh?

[noidentity]

Or the "pay this recycling fee and get free recycling later*" kind of free that is common in advertisement material.

* Fee must be paid to qualify for free recycling.

Re:Huh?

[ChameleonDave]

If the government is providing something for "no charge" then they probably already charged you for it through your taxes. Just because you didn't explicitly pay for it that doesn't mean that you got it for free.

Did you miss the entire discussion? I went into some detail about how not paying for something you receive means you've got it for free.

Re:Huh?

[ElleyKitten]

It's called Michael Moore logic. If the government provides it, it's by definition "free". It'll be free to some people. People who can't afford new computers will get used, and then when it gets so old that it's completely unusable or it breaks, then they'll have something to do with it without spending money that they don't have. If I buy a $2000 computer from Dell I'm not going to notice $5 or $10 for recycling, so I'd rather pay it upfront than have to spend it later or push the cost onto some poor person or organization I donate it to later.

Of course, that would be great if they where actually recycling them instead of smelting them.

Re:Huh?

[Kadin2048]

Hopefully B.C. isn't re-inventing the wheel and they will have a similar system.

Well, based on what at least one of TFAs said, they're not going to. They're just planning on handing everything over to a group of electronics manufacturers, who'll then ship everything to a smelter to be incinerated.

Good way to eliminate the secondary market for electronics.

Re:Huh?

[epine]

You've just argued yourself into a puff of non-existence. If you state, rightly, that the concept of "free" (of charge) in the global definition is non-existent in practice, then the local definition of "free" is free to prevail linguistically, and the local definition of free is that there is no cost at the time of transaction (perhaps it was paid for ahead of time). Almost everything in life that initially appears "free" has strings attached. Even sex with your spouse.

The "out of thin air" definition of free has no use whatsoever except when applied to the gullible. Since the medium of television is built on the premise that all viewers are gullible, we're exposed to that definition a lot more than logic justifies. Nevertheless, in any serious discussion, the participants all understand that free always comes with a price.

Once upon a time hauling crap out to the local landfill was free. Only it wasn't free. Free was just a handy synonym for externalization of cost onto society as a whole. You don't have to posit government as a delivery mechanism to point this out. Perhaps the society decides to go light on government and the cost is expressed in reduced life expectancy from drinking really crappy water. Name your poison. Oppressive taxation is but one small slice on the dart board.

I thought the original post was more on track than your response. In the old days, the ultimate cost of all that "free" dumping at the landfill was left as an exercise to the dumpers and local population. With this new program, it's entirely clear who is picking up the tab (the citizenry through the delivery mechanism of government). That does not amount to some magical slight-of-hand in the semantics of "free". In my books, it actually amounts to a clarification.

Some people might prefer the old situation where in the muddle of who was finally picking up the tab, it was possible that government wouldn't be it: ideology before clarity. I personally prefer the new situation. If anyone in the private sector feels strongly enough about putting the government out of this business, please step forward with a viable plan. Only if the mechanisms of government guarantee monopoly profits? Ah, I thought so.

Re:Huh?

[ChameleonDave]

The basic premise of government is to form a collective which is empowered by "people" to run certain affairs on their behalf, right? Indeed. Which makes it not a corporation taking money in strict exchange for products, but instead a very different public body that does public service with one hand, and takes taxes with the other in order to handle inflation. (Remember that the state can print as much money as it likes, so taxation is purely to keep the overall amount of money out there from spiralling upwards.)

And the manner of providing funding is typically through control of the land/air/sea/etc resources and of late - taxation and more taxation. That means that anything, ANYTHING for which tax moneys and government revenues were applied are paid services. So, if you don't leave any rubbish outside, or if you don't use the streets much, the state lowers your taxes accordingly? No, these are not commercial services for which you are paying. They are offered to all for free (even to foreign visitors in many cases), and the state levies taxes in order for this to be possible.

Kinda reminds me of my cell phone plan - they charge me for service monthly but I'm always invoiced a month ahead.. That means they have my cash in hand for a month before it is applied to the services it was billed as.

Mobile phone companies are scumbags who try to abuse their powerful position in order to force consumers into a situation similar to taxation, but at the end of the day they are not states but corporations, and you choose to either pay for and use their service, or not pay for and not use their service.

Oh - I checked http//dictionary.com and the most closely related definitions to this thread, of the word "free":

That's an American dictionary, and so of no interest to me, especially as all dictionaries have only brief summaries of the meanings of words, rather than the in-depth discussion which is relevant here, but I'll go along with you.

2. provided without, or not subject to, a charge or payment: free parking; a free sample.
3. given without consideration of a return or reward: a free offer of legal advice.

These two are the same. They refer to stuff you get without paying. Note that the examples given involve some sort of strings attached as well as payment somewhere along the line. For example, a free sample of cosmetics is designed to entice the customer to buy a full unit of the product. Free parking is often provided by a local council, and paid for with tax money.

Since I was arguing that it is normal English usage to describe such things as free of charge as long as there is no immediate exchange, your dictionary definition fully supports what I was saying.

when was the last time any forward-looking project was undertaken by government without the idea of winning votes? I can't recall any instance of that.

You seem to be fighting a straw man here. I am saying that it is standard English usage to describe something as free of charge, despite such things as hidden motives, extra money being paid down the line, et cetera.

You seem to be saying that such factors as ulterior motives and prior payments mean that virtually nothing can be described as free, and that by describing these things as free, I must have somehow missed these factors. By listing factors, you wrongly imply naïveté on my part.

To sum up, I am using the term "free of charge" correctly (according to both my argument and the dictionary definition provided by you), and you are using it incorrectly, giving it a rather novel sense.

Re:Huh?

[innocent_white_lamb]

I still use an older Compaq laptop (333mhz, 128mb of Ram) as a web server for a not very busy local sports league. It runs an Ubuntu lamp install and has a phpbb forum and about 100 unique visitors per day. Speed of the machine is never an issue.
 
Have you taken the power consumption of that machine vs a newer model into consideration as well?
 
I suspect that newer "regular" machines (not power user boxes) use less power than they did back-when. Is that actually the case?

Re:Huh?

[Firethorn]

I suspect that newer "regular" machines (not power user boxes) use less power than they did back-when. Is that actually the case?

To an extent. They usually use about the same amount of power, but newer machines do far more with the power they do use.

For the previous poster - his website could probably be hosted on basic enterprise level machine with at least a thousand other small time websites. I wouldn't be surprised if you could host a hundred thousand with load balancing between five servers. Individual sites would be less likely to be slashdotted as a bonus.

Sure, it might use five times the power, but it's doing a thousand times the work. That and you don't have to worry about a ten year old laptop HD failing without notice.

People do tend to upgrade for a reason. Yes, we could do more reutilization - but after a point trying to deal with older, slower, no longer made or supported hardware isn't worth it. There are reasons why many companies will replace perfectly usable vehicles with new ones - It's actually cheaper to sell the old ones and maintain a limited number of models of vehicles. You don't have to train the techs in as many types of vehicle, keep fewer varieties of spare parts on hand, etc...

Re:Huh?

[Firethorn]

Do you pay taxes? If so, it's not free. It's simply that you don't receive a separate bill for the service, it's bundled into your income/sales/property taxes. In the case of the article, it's now a separate fee, much like the tire disposal fee I paid when I last bought a set of tires. Sure, they disposed of my old ones, but I had to pay the fee even when I bought my snow tires - which wasn't a trade in set, I even bought separate rims for them. In exchange, any place that sells tires would have to take them in for disposal if I asked them to.

The government may provide services without a direct charge - but we all end up paying for them through taxes. As I'm a taxpayer, I don't consider those services free. The money has already been extracted from me, under threat of confiscation and/or force.

Re:Huh?

[theshowmecanuck]

There is a reason they call it Vancouver B.C. --> Vancouver, Bring Cash

Re:Huh?

[reboot246]

Nothing the government does is "free". Or are you one of the millions who don't pay taxes? Somebody has to pay even if you don't.

Re:Huh?

[drsquare]

Is it nicer to go to a place where you must fork over cash to do anything even after passing through the gate, or to go to an all expenses payed resort?

The former. With the latter, you've paid for things even if you don't want them, so you end up forcing yourself to use them, even if you don't really like them. You're effectively trapped there, you can't go anywhere else because you've paid for being there.

Not to mention all-inclusive resorts generally have the atmosphere of holiday camps.

Re:Huh?

[Graff]

OK lets take one of your examples:

If you stop me in the street and ask me for directions, and I help you out without asking for a fee in return, I am giving you a free service. It is irrelevant that you as a consumer or a taxpayer are part of a system that has, for example, provided us with streets to talk about, or which has provided me with healthcare to be able to be there. It is also free even if I decide I will only grant these requests if other people have similarly helped me out. Now this analogy falls apart when you compare it to how government programs REALLY work. The government doesn't have random helpful people walking around giving out stuff free of charge. Instead the government has PAID employees whose JOB it is to provide services for you. These people get paid from money which you gave to the government in the form of TAXES. There is nothing for free, if the government doesn't collect taxes then these people don't get paid and then there are no government programs giving stuff out for "free".

Yes, there is no immediate, per-instance cost of a lot of government services. Instead you pay continuously in installments for the privilege of getting services for "free". A better analogy would be those offers you get in the store, "buy two apples, get one FREE". You don't get the third apple for free, instead you get 3 apples for the cost of 2 of them. As a matter of fact you probably didn't even get a discount at all since they most likely just bumped up the price of each apple by 33% in the first place.

And on that note I'll refer you to TANSTAAFL

Re:Huh?

[ChameleonDave]

You seem to have missed most of the discussion.

Re:Huh?

[ChameleonDave]

* Fee must be paid to qualify for free recycling.
Except that it doesn't. You get free recycling regardless of whether (a) you have paid, (b) someone else has paid, or (c) no one paid because the computer was bought elsewhere or bought before the charges came in. It's a clear example of a public service, rather than a service for a fee.

Re:Huh?

[the_womble]

The other problem with it is that by forcing the cost to be paid at purchase, rather than on disposal, it removes the incentive to re-use.

The best thing to do with an old PC is to try and find a new use for it (or sell it to someone who can use it). If disposal is free, it will, in many cases, become cheaper to simply let the government dispose of it.

Re:Huh?

[Nullav]

How about charging the user after the item is recycled, or, for that matter, actually recycling it? This is nothing but a thinly-veiled way to extort the public by charging them an 'if' tax.

Re:Huh?

[Nullav]

Well then it's free...for him.

Re:Huh?

[Znork]

"What is important about this change is not the mis-use of the word "free", but the shifting of the burden to the purchaser, rather than to the tax payer."

As long as it has no other negative effects; take a look at "intellectual property", which is the ultimate privatized taxation scheme. The burden of paying for the system is shifted to the consumer, but the producer has no interest at all in providing the economy with the most efficient solution to the problem, but rather uses it to maximize revenue streams.

In this case the companies have no interest in minimizing environmental impact; their interest is still to maximize revenue, and smelting as much as possible of any hardware that could compete with their new sales is a priority. The cost to the economy as a whole with the loss of the wealth represented in the destruction of still working hardware becomes enormous, but as it isnt accounted for other than in some going without that hardware and others adding to the sales of new hardware, it's not immediately obvious in cold hard numbers of lost wealth.

Re:Huh?

[KDR_11k]

However it also removes the incentive for illegal disposal so depending on the situation in the country it may be worth the tradeoff.

Re:Huh?

[Talchas]

It wouldn't be literally free no matter what - it would still have been paid out of taxes of some sort, which then couldn't be used for something else.

Re:Huh?

[that this is not und]

Yes. It's similar to the 'send it back to Dell' goody-B.S. that gets great praise in certain circles. Send those old Optiplexes back to Dell. They'll dispose of them quickly and make certain only the newest models are in the market. Microsoft loves stuff like that, too.

Linux likely wouldn't even exist if there wasn't a huge and wide dispersal of used 'x86 hardware for free to have run it on in the past (it's kinda a bloat scene now, though). Back in the day we all ran Linux on our orphaned 'doze boxes that wouldn't work with the Redmond bloat anymore.

I go to a lot of surplus equipment auctions, and I see how the tards that run them and (for the most part) frequent them think. All the actually cool hardware (old Sun boxes, classic old stuff) gets shrinkwrapped on big skids (that you're forced to buy as big mass quantities) and sold essentially as 'scrap' while the tards mill around the older P3 and P4 boxes saying "hmmmm, is this good enough to install da-'doze on??" It's really an annoying bunch of tards to cope with.

Re:Huh?

[that this is not und]

No, you're just being stubborn about pedantic points. For unknown reasons.

The old bromide 'nothing is free in life' holds here. But somebody made fun of Mikey up there and it's clear that it threw you off on your tangent.

Re:Huh?

[that this is not und]

Once upon a time hauling crap out to the local landfill was free. Only it wasn't free. Free was just a handy synonym for externalization of cost onto society as a whole.

The old 'haul stuff to the landfill' methods of the past were actually not that socially costly at all. My grandpa always came back from the dump with a bunch of good stuff somebody else hauled there that he got for free. A practice which isn't permitted anymore because the tight-ass 'do gooder' sorts got involved. Similar to the 'lock it down and destroy' it fascists who run many computer recycling operations.

And further out, the 'social cost' of landfills is yet undefined. I contend that some of the most valuable land 100 years out from now will be former landfills. We have been, yes, VERY wasteful in how we use and discard things. There's literally gold in them landfills, and much more, waiting for later generations to pull it back out and use it. All the 'plastic' that enviro-types rant about is basically stored energy. If we burn off enough of the other petroleum, the reserves of petrochemical stored in the landfills as inert plastic waste will become more and more valuable. A hundred years from now they'll be cursing the do-gooder fucks with the big trash incinerators and saying 'why didn't they use more landfills?'

Re:Huh?

[Firethorn]

Nope - followed it all the way back.

My point still stands. NOTHING the government provides is free. There's always a price hidden somewhere - usually a quite outrageous one.

Let's take federal school subsidies. These are programs where schools get money from the feds for this or that, such as new computers, textbooks, security guards, whatever.

Because of the complexities that are federal programs only a third of the dollars that congress provides to the department reach the school. The rest are eaten up by 'operating expenses'. Many schools actually have employees dedicated to generating requests for federal dollars - if the employee manages to pull even 10% over what she costs the school, it's worth it. It's all horribly inefficient.

Going back to your hospital example - I pay nearly 10% of my income to support the social services program. Even at this relatively early point of my life, it'd take a heck of a lot of medical care to exceed what I've paid into the system, even at the outrageous prices they like to charge.

Even if the government doesn't charge for it, they borrow or print the money to provide the services, which leads to inflation, making my $20 bill able to purchase half of what it could when I was a teen.

Re:Huh?

[that this is not und]

Conversely, you pay for the 'free' recycling program, wether (a) you use it, (b) you have any need to use it, or (c) a bunch of other people use it. Consequently it's a clear example of a tax burden placed unfairly on many people who don't want it.

All your sweetness and light covers up the fact that you seem to be real keen on everybody sloughing lotsa their dough into the public coffers. Are you a civil service worker or a government bureaucrat? Or just one of their 'useful idiots'?

Re:Huh?

[feed_me_cereal]

I haven't seen sicko yet, but does he refer to it as "free" in the movie? when searching for "free healthcare" "michael moore", all I seem to pull up is conservative websites bashing him... (as opposed to searching only for "michael moore", where only half of the sites that come up are bashing him ;)

Re:Huh?

[Fishead]

Removes the incentive to re-use? I would argue that by increasing the replacement price you have added an incentive to hang on to it for a while longer.

But I am in BC, and not eager about the chance to pay more for my electronics. Hopefully they don't fill in the internet hole for a while.

Re:Huh?

[blacklint]

Agreed. Although I'm generally libertarian in thinking, this is one example of an added up front fee that I would support for exactly the reason you specified. My dad used to get a whole bunch of old macs (IIci's and the like), fix them up, and donate them to the local elementary schools. However, in doing so, we would have to deal with a lot of computers that really were broken. Especially old CRTs cost a LOT to dispose of. It really was a huge disincentive try and save old computers, as each one you dealt with was a monetary liability.

Re:Huh?

[ChameleonDave]

The fact that you are still giving examples of hidden costs means you have missed the point I made at great length.

Re:Huh?

[ChameleonDave]

Conversely, you pay for the 'free' recycling program, w[h]ether (a) you use it, (b) you have any need to use it, or (c) a bunch of other people use it. Which supports what I'm saying: that it's not a transaction. It's a service for society as a whole provided by society as a whole.

Consequently it's a clear example of a tax burden placed unfairly Your silly right-wing opinion regarding its fairness is rather irrelevant in the discussion about the meaning of the term "free of charge".

All your sweetness and light Why, thank you.

Are you a civil service worker or a government bureaucrat? Or just one of their 'useful idiots'? Have you stopped beating your wife?.

Re:Huh?

[UbuntuDupe]

I only saw a few clips from sicko, but one that completely astounded me was where Michael Moore acts all amazed at how the cashier's office in a UK hospital is not for receiving payments, but for compensating people who had to bear certain costs in getting care. (I think it was transportation, or "transport" since it's UK.)

Okay, cool, got it: no additional costs for people when they use a hospital.

But then right afterward, he does this whole sequence where he shows all this cash being handed out, highlighting the idea that HEY!!! FREE MONEY!!! w00t!

It's like he's not just ignorant of how that money comes right out of your hide to pay for the system, but actually revels in that ignorance, and think it's the coolest thing about the UK's health care system. FREE MONEY AT HOSPITALS! Yay!

Who is that supposed to convince? I mean, regardless of what you think needs to be done about health care, why is it so "totally cool" that you can get cash payouts at hospitals from tax money?

Here's the clip, skip to 0:28, although it kind of cuts off the money sequence early.

Re:Huh?

[AdamWill]

You could all just use the standard and abundantly clear form of words the U.K. figured out to describe the N.H.S. several decades ago - "free at the point of delivery" - and SHUT UP ALREADY. sheesh.

Re:Huh?

[RexRhino]

Good point, calling the recycling program "free" is incorrect. In this case it would be better to call it a deposit on the proper disposal of your electronics. If that $2000 you just spent on your laptop doesn't include the cost to dispose of it then you're basically just assuming welfare from your fellow citizens and/or your descendants to cover the cost of its disposal and cleanup. Or rather, a deposit on the IMPROPER disposal of your electronics.

Instead of paying a recycling company $10 to actually, you know, recycle your electronics... there will be a government monopoly that will charge you double, and won't actually bother to recycle electronics in any meaningful way (instead they are opting to burn them down in an smelter). This will put the people who actually recycle/reuse electronics in a responsible way out of buisness.

They are charging for "proper disposal", the same way that the mafia often charges for "protection".

It is funny how hard people will defend behavior by the government that would get people thrown in prison for anti-trust and criminal fraud violations if it was a private buisness.

Re:Huh?

[RexRhino]

However it also removes the incentive for illegal disposal so depending on the situation in the country it may be worth the tradeoff. Except that there is no real difference between the legal and illegal disposal. It is not like they are running a proper recycling program. They are just incinerating the old computers. Not much difference between that and just throwing the PC in a dumpster with the rest of the trash.

If they are going to be charging for "proper disposal", maybe they should actually properly dispose of the things.

Re:Huh?

[Firethorn]

The fact that the costs are hidden doesn't mean it's there, so an intelligent person should realize that even if he's not charged everytime he goes to the doctor that it still costs money. Same with car insurance - the less people use it, the less the insurance has to be, which is why good drivers tend to be charged less for insurance.

Making all the costs hidden tends to encourage overconsumption, which ends up costing more money. When it's distributed like a government health care plan would be, it ends up costing us all money. Either that or you end up with waiting lists.

The US healthcare market isn't a failure of a free trade economy model, because we aren't one. Healthcare is provided by the employer - who doesn't really care for matching the plan to the individual family.

Re:Huh?

[SnapShot]

I don't actually disagree with you. The perfect world would have everyone paying to dispose of their electronics and other waste responsibly and, just as important, understand that the price tag at BestBuy is only part of the Total Cost of Ownership. In other words, a magical world where everyone carts their old monitor down to the free-market monitor recyclers and happily pay some money for the privilege.

The problem is (and where most libertarian utopias fall apart) is that without an economic incentive to do "right" that outweighs the convenience of doing "wrong" most people won't. You and I agree that a government solution is not the best possible solution but fail to offer an alternate scenario based on anything but the futile hope that people will take responsibility for their actions.

Re:Huh?

[RexRhino]

You and I agree that a government solution is not the best possible solution but fail to offer an alternate scenario based on anything but the futile hope that people will take responsibility for their actions.

Two questions:

1. Why is it futile to expect people to take responsible actions for themselves? At some point, for civil society to function, it depends on most people doing the right thing on their own most of the time. Most people would voluntarily take their electronics down to the free-market electronic recycler if they understand the issue, something that the growing private electronics recycling industry proves. Most people throw out their monitor at the curb because they haven't been educated to the fact that they should do anything else.

2. How is the new system based on anything other than the futile hope that people will take responsiblity for their actions? How does charging someone an extra $20 when they purchase electronics make them any more likely to choose to properly dispose of their electronics?

Re:Huh?

[SnapShot]

1. Because I'm a cynic and I haven't seen a situation where my cynicism isn't justified. Even in relatively green cities like Portland, OR and Seattle, WA the percentage of recycling isn't particularly high. In cities like Baltimore, MD it's almost non-existent. And, even if education could inspire a non-trivial percentage of the population to recycle their electronics, are we going to depend on the government to properly educate the citizens and how are we going to pay for this massive education campaign?

2. True. However, if this is important enough then you have two options:
    a) set the deposit so that it completely covers the true cost to not only dispose of the electronics but also to fish all the not-properly disposed of items from the waste stream,
    or b) you make it work like Oregon's bottle deposit law where even if I'm too lazy to recycle my monitor that homeless guy will definitely pluck it out of my trash to claim my deposit.

Re:Huh?

[ChameleonDave]

The fact that the costs are hidden doesn't mean it's [not] there Straw man.

charging for free service???

[3seas]

ain't no mo free...

On a more serious note, there is more value to be extracted from electronic junk then for the same weight of ore in mining.

Perhaps this is an opportunity for improving the recycling process and maybe adjust the manufacturing process to accomodate the end life cycle of recycling.

Errr.......

[Maelwryth]

"adding a recycling fee to new computers and TVs to pay for their free electronics recycling program"
 
.....oh dear.

not news

[ardiesr]

This fee is already charged in Alberta for the last couple of years. It was also introduced in Saskatchewan in February.

It could also soon be charged in Ontario:
http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Science/2007/06/12/425 4704-cp.html

Re:not news

[Anonymous Coward]

Damn it! I was just thinking ... "Well, now I'll just go to the United States of Alberta to buy my next computer then." (Also, there is no Provincial Sales Tax in Alberta).

Re:not news

[RealGrouchy]

It doesn't surprise me that the Ontario Government will want to do this, too.

Of course, whether it makes sense to do so will not matter to the Ontario government. What matters is it doesn't cost them anything, and it makes them look like they've done something for the environment.

Consider, for example, how quickly the Ontario passed a ban on incandescent lightbulbs after the idea was first raised in Australia.

- RG>

Re:not news

[canuck57]

This fee is already charged in Alberta for the last couple of years. It was also introduced in Saskatchewan in February.

While quite true. Why not do a complete job and have the prison system take ALL garbage, sort it into recycle. Aluminum here, paper there, biodegradable here, electronics there in stead of sitting on their asses for release date.

And cut yet another form of taxation. GST+PST+EST is getting tax nuts. Almost 20% not including excise. As it IS about TAXES -- they want more of YOUR money!

Re:not news

[Noishe]

There may be no tax in Alberta, but that doesn't effect you one iota if you're from BC. Even if you buy something PST free in Alberta, if you don't charge yourself 7% PST for BC and send in a form to remit it, you're breaking the law. http://www.rev.gov.bc.ca/ctb/forms/0428PFILL.pdf.

Hope you don't get an audit...

Saskatchewan has had this for a while

[innocent_white_lamb]

http://www.sweepit.ca/

http://www.sarcsarcan.ca/sarcan/electronics_recycl ing.php

Re:Saskatchewan has had this for a while

[saskboy]

And what the article author didn't know is that motherboards are pretty much exempt. Also they can't be recycled, unless surrounded by a desktop case.

Duh.

[SnoopJeDi]

The list of what is acceptable for recycling is short, namely computers, printers, and TVs

It's to pay for their printer recycling program!

Captain Obvious to the rescue

[CmdrPorno]

Well, if you have to pay a tax for it, it ain't exactly free, is it?

Re:Captain Obvious to the rescue

[derrida]

Prepaid.

Re:Captain Obvious to the rescue

[Millenniumman]

"public"

Re:Captain Obvious to the rescue

[Nephilium]

Personally... I prefer:

socialized

At least as the proper definition... But that may just be me...

Nephilium...

wanted: universal translator

[v1]

But, and I emphasize the word 'but', simply having these old consumer electronics materials carted off to an smelter in trail is ever so head scratching.

what's truly ever so head-scratching is this author's command of grammar.

Re:wanted: universal translator

[Gerafix]

There is a town in BC, most notable for its smoke stacks and plants I suppose, named Trail.

Re:wanted: universal translator

[gobbo]

Ah, beautiful Trail, BC, industrial jewel of the soot-and-arsenic laden mountains.

Not New

[pipingguy]

Alberta already has something similar for monitors and televisions.

In Ontario

[akypoon]

Legislation is being discussed but not implemented yet. There are words that the new tax will come after February 2008.

Since Ontario already has 14% taxes on electronics (6% Federal + 8% Provincial), the add on recycle tax could increase the total taxes to about 17-20%. So considering an average video card costs around C$130-150, consumers are expected to pay about C$30 more off the listed price.

An alternative to tax increase? How about have people who want to dispose their working electronics to claim tax credit if they manage to sell the items off in used market? My experience is that if you sell each item below C$20, local people (seniors in particular) would buy it and in effect recycle them for you for free!

Re:In Ontario

[BlueParrot]

Not sure how you did your maths there, but if C$150 is 114% then 1% is C$1.32 and thus 120% would give C$158.4 which is an increase of C$8.4 and not C$30 as claimed. It looks as if you meant that the total cost due to taxes was 20% of 150, but in that case the main bulk of the cost is the federal and provicial tax, not the new tax, and thus saying consumers are expected to pay C$30 more is rather misleading in context. With the higher estimate this tax would result in you paying C$9 more for a card that was priced C$150 without tax. I.e, rather than paying C$171 you would pay C$180. Not saying you are wrong ( depending on what you actually meant ) but your statement was a bit unclear.

How did they think it would be recycled?

[Mspangler]

"But one report says that the e-waste won't be recycled at all, but rather burned in a smelter."

But dropping it in a smelter is recycling. Junk goes in, refined metal comes out. Smelters do not run on solid fuel anymore, they can't grind up the circuit boards and feed them to the burners.

The organics will burn in the charge, the fiberglass will melt into the slag, the metals will dissolve into the melt.

I forgot how to separate the lead from the copper. (pyrometallurgy class was in 1988, and I went the hydrometallurgy route instead)

Now I'll have to look it up.

The pyro class took a field trip to Trail, neat place if you are into displays of brute power. Sometimes I miss mining. Phys met is so boring; did it corrode .005 in/yr, or 0.010? zzzzzz But it's what pays the bills.

Re:How did they think it would be recycled?

[Phanatic1a]

The organics will burn in the charge, the fiberglass will melt into the slag, the metals will dissolve into the melt.

If it's profitable to obtain raw metals in this fashion, why do they need to charge a fee to do it?

You don't need to charge a fee to recycle aluminum cans. Well before recycling was widespread in the US, I remember hauling garbage bags full of empties down to a local recycling center, which then paid *us* for delivering valuable aluminum to them. If nobody's willing to pay you for your old computer components, then trying to recycle them is a pretty dumb idea.

Re:How did they think it would be recycled?

[Firethorn]

I'd have to agree with this. Especially given that certain materials in the components are indeed present in larger quantities than they are in raw ore, combined with that there are more metals period would tend to indicate that the only benefit to using raw ore would be that of quantity - you have to collect computer components from all over to get enough to make it worth firing up the smelter, while you can built your refinery on site of the mine and process however many tones of ore that you feel like. The disposal fee could be for transportation of the disposed devices to the center.

Let's see, average computer:
Steel - valuable recyclable material pretty much from when we discovered it(and iron as well).
Aluminum - valuable material, local places will buy aluminum if you bring it to them(cans are only one of the things they'll take)
Copper - even better than steel
Gold - even better than copper
Lead - cheap, but very easy to recycle. As a shooter, for a couple hundred dollars investment I could start casting my own bullets. Scrap lead such as wheel weights are readily available. Along with the lead will be tin, silver, zinc, etc...
Silicone is rather common, though you might be able to recycle it, and while plastic is recyclable it's generally not worth the hassle. Various other trace elements - present in things like capacitors and alloys for the steel and solder. You'll also get the occasional oddball like titanium.

Re:How did they think it would be recycled?

[moosesocks]

I don't think that it's very easy/efficent to separate most of these things when they're all together in a sort of mish-mosh.

Likewise, despite being cheap, you've gotta make sure the lead is disposed of properly, along with the various other nasty material that goes into making CRTs and capacitors.

Silicon's so chemically inert that you may have trouble re-processing it efficiently.

Re:How did they think it would be recycled?

[Eccles]

If it's profitable to obtain raw metals in this fashion, why do they need to charge a fee to do it?

Who said it was profitable? The raw materials value and energy produced may be worth less than the cost of running the operation. However, it reduces the expense of landfilling the items, and reduces the amount of certain unpleasant chemicals in the landfill. It also might encourage the reuse of certain parts of the system (say, doing a motherboard swap instead of buying a new system) which would further reduce the amount of trash.

Re:How did they think it would be recycled?

[going_the_2Rpi_way]

If it's profitable to obtain raw metals in this fashion, why do they need to charge a fee to do it?

MRF's need to make money to operate, and it can either be through material recovery or from funding/fees/deposits or a combination of both. So in many cases, MRFs are only allowed access to the aluminum in blue boxes on the condition they recycle the glass (little profit) and paper (no profit, really) as well. It's not really worth their time. In the same way, I suspect that while some PC components are quite valuable and recoverable in a marketable form, others involve less profitable and probably more haz mats that now need landfills, permits, etc.

This is one reason why in most places hauling aluminum cans out of blue boxes/recycling bins is usually illegal -- you're stealing money from the system.

If nobody's willing to pay you for your old computer components, then trying to recycle them is a pretty dumb idea.

Well, given the current state of metal reserves, it's probably not, actually.

Re:How did they think it would be recycled?

[Firethorn]

I don't think that it's very easy/efficent to separate most of these things when they're all together in a sort of mish-mosh.

It's not really that hard either given a properly set up smelter. Besides, they have to do it anyways even when working with raw ore.

Likewise, despite being cheap, you've gotta make sure the lead is disposed of properly, along with the various other nasty material that goes into making CRTs and capacitors.

Who's talking about disposing of it? Lead, despite being toxic, is still a valuable commodity - every ton we recover from old equipment is a ton we don't have to refine from raw ore.

Though you do have to contain it - Lead and mercury have relatively low boiling points, so go vaporous pretty easily - For example, iron has a melting point of ~1,538 C, while lead boils ~1,740 degrees. Mercury, with a boiling point of a mere 357 degrees, would be vapor long before the iron/steel melts. It's up to scrubbers to recover it. Again, replace 'safely disposed of' with 'sold at a profit'. While not used as much in things like thermometers as much today, there's still plenty of industrial uses for the material.

Silicon I'm hesitant about recycling - for one it's extremely common, two it's inert, so disposal is cheap, and they're rather sensitive about purity levels - which a smelter isn't going to give you.

Maybe a glass manufacturing plant could use it, maybe not.

Re:How did they think it would be recycled?

[Phanatic1a]

The raw materials value and energy produced may be worth less than the cost of running the operation. However, it reduces the expense of landfilling the items

So I get to pay a fee to reduce the expenses of a landfill company? That's nothing less than a subsidy to the guy running the landfill.

Re:How did they think it would be recycled?

[Eccles]

So I get to pay a fee to reduce the expenses of a landfill company?

Landfills are typically government run, AFAIK. If they're not, they're generally government or neighborhood contracts, and get paid by the amount dumped. So you're reducing your tax bill, not giving a private enterprise money.

70 places to recycle in the province?

[loraksus]

Just in case people don't understand how big BC is - it's 357,216 square miles - think California, Nevada and Oregon put together (which total ~366,000 square miles)
And while it's population is only 4,352,798, it's still a lot of people.

The BC government plans to cover all that with only 70 locations to turn in materials.
Right, whatever.

This is nothing more than blatant thievery by the BC government and "Encorp", the company administering the whole process.

Re:70 places to recycle in the province?

[topham]

Most of the population in B.C. is in the lower-mainland.

The rest is quite low density and, a side from a few hot spots, is quite spread out.

Even if they aren't covered by the program, or choose not to take advantage of it because of distance, etc, it won't be a significant impact.

Re:70 places to recycle in the province?

[DerekLyons]

Just in case people don't understand how big BC is - it's 357,216 square miles - think California, Nevada and Oregon put together (which total ~366,000 square miles) And while it's population is only 4,352,798, it's still a lot of people.
 
The BC government plans to cover all that with only 70 locations to turn in materials.

This is one of those cases of "lying with numbers".
 
It's quite possible to cover the vast majority of the people with so few stations - because most of BC is utterly empty. Of the total population, nearly half live in the Metro Vancouver area - easily covered with 20 or so turn in locations.
 
 

This is nothing more than blatant thievery by the BC government and "Encorp", the company administering the whole process.

Considering the misreprestantions you made - I'd consider carefully the glass walls of your own house.

Re:70 places to recycle in the province?

[GISGEOLOGYGEEK]

The total lack of any business sense shown by the parent clearly exposes him as an NDP hack who is upset that the Liberals did something about the problem.

Of course if the NDP in general had any business sense, they wouldn't have more than doubled our provincial debts while claiming their budgets were balanced.

Re:70 places to recycle in the province?

[loraksus]

I think it's hilarious that I've been called a right wing shill and a ndp hack in response to the same post.
Apparently mouthbreathing nutters like yourself can only go "OMG!@!1 diffrant oppinionz! HESS A [insert whatever here]"
Great job! Were you on the debate team in middle school?

Re:70 places to recycle in the province?

[jjohnson]

For all its size, the population of BC is massively concentrated on Vancouver Island, the lower mainland (i.e., Vancouver and surrounding municipalities), and 10-20 other significantly large population centers in the mountains that are along major highways. Most of the land in BC is uninhabited or uninhabitable by more than a trickle of people. 70 locations is more than sufficient for an initial rollout, at least to catch the overwhelming majority of ewaste to actually recycle.

At a rough guess, 20-30 locations will handle 80% of the population in virtue of its concentration.

Burning in a smelter is stupid....

[Fallen Kell]

There is more gold and copper per pound in e-waste then there is in gold or copper ore. There is a LOT of potential to "mine" this for the metals, however the lead and mercury content is also high....

Re:Burning in a smelter is stupid....

[wkitchen]

Just what is it that you think a smelter does?

Re:Burning in a smelter is stupid....

[Mspangler]

"however the lead and mercury content is also high"

Lead is worth good money. When I toured the Trail smelter it had a lead side and a zinc side. I'm not sure how much mercury there is in the electronic scrap, but it should be recoverable. And if you can collect it, all these compact fluorescent lights need it to work. So that will recycle too.

California Has Done This

[DavidD_CA]

Since Jan 2005, California has been charging an E-Waste Recovery Fee for some time now. Whenever you sell something to a California resident that has a display (CRT/LCD/etc), you have to charge this fee and give it to the state:

    4-15 inches : $6
    15-35 inches: $8
    35+ inches : $10

The fee is not a deposit either, like you have on soda cans. If you take your CRT to the dump later, even if you can prove you paid that E-Waste fee, you still have to pay the dump to take your trash.

More Info: http://www.erecycle.org/

Re:California Has Done This

[that this is not und]

The nice thing is that CRTs are made of 'safety glass' and if you smack them good and hard in the right way, they literally fragmentize into little tiny bits of glass.

Small enough that it all fits in a nice small grocery bag, nestled in the middle of your rotten vegtable peelings in the trash bin.

Re:California Has Done This

[mr_matticus]

Um, all the collection sites take the equipment for free. You drive in, tell them you have e-waste to dispose of, and they direct you to the bins. Toss it in and drive out. I've done this in four counties and never paid a single cent. That's sort of the whole point of the fee.

Re:California Has Done This

[DavidD_CA]

You might have experienced one of the many free dump stations (or even a "Dump Day") where you're giving your electronics to a private business. They take your stuff and melt it down and sell it.

Had you have taken your stuff to a county dump, they'd have charged you their normal fees.

At least, that's how it is here in San Joaquin County. But if we give our stuff to Waste Management, it's free.

Re:California Has Done This

[mr_matticus]

Neither Yolo nor Santa Clara County landfills charge for depositing these goods. There were no charges at collection sites in Contra Costa and San Francisco counties as well. These were all locations listed at the counties' respective waste disposal websites, at varying times and in varying quantities from two monitors to an entire pickup bed of decommissioned hardware.

The whole point of assessing this fee is so that waste collection sites will take these products without hassle and I have had no problems on approximately 10 such trips. The California state website established for this issue sets out the guidelines and shows how the collectors seek reimbursement from the state fund in accordance with this act. If it's a site designated for the purpose, you don't pay anything at the dropoff.

You probably went to a non-participating location or dealt with someone who didn't understand the program. There are 14 participating locations in your county according to DTSC. If your location is charging you AND collecting from the state, you should find somewhere else to take your old stuff.

Re:California Has Done This

[DavidD_CA]

Hmmm.... good info! I will have to check into this stuff next time I dump something.

It was an official county site, so I'm sure they'd have to participate. It's not like I could really argue with the person though.

Thanks!

Why do they call it recycling....

[mark-t]

... When they don't actually recycle the product, but apparently only dispose of it?

Re:Why do they call it recycling....

[EraseEraseMe]

How do you think metal are recycled exactly? Does Superman come in and bend broken motherboards into brand new steel?

No, they're melted down and leeched into seperate metals.

Re:Why do they call it recycling....

[Omega Leader-(P12)]

Please read the article, they recover the metal.

Re:Why do they call it recycling....

[mark-t]

There's more to e-waste than metal though. There's also plastic, glass, and other elements that would just be wasted if thrown into a smelter where only the metal is collected.

Re:Why do they call it recycling....

[_prime]

Some more details here:

http://www.southkootenay.com/cms/Teck_Cominco_Q_A. 400.0.html

Everything is shredded and fed into the furnace. The combustible wood and plastic materials burn at high temperatures as fuel, generating heat that is recovered in steam boilers. The metals are recovered through the metallurgical processes in the furnace, and the residual material blends with the ferrous granules that are used in the manufacture of cement.

Re:Why do they call it recycling....

[Graff]

The plastic is just fuel for the process, it reduces the amount of oil or natural gas you would need to run the smelter. The glass actually helps you a bit because it becomes part of the slag which assists in the separation process.

With a well-designed process you can get pretty good efficiencies out of the smelter and also keep emissions into the environment at a low level. With modern smokestack scrubbers and effluent recovery systems you can re-capture elements that you can turn around and sell in order to defray the costs of running the plant. You'd be surprised at just how far waste recovery systems have come in the last 20 years or so.

Re:Why do they call it recycling....

[Firethorn]

All the more reason to wonder why they'd have to charge a fee to do it, you'd expect them to be able to turn a profit. 'We'll take your old computer for *FREE*!' As they gloat about the valuable elements in it.

After all, that's what many places will do with cars.

Norway has had it for years

[[Theo]]

In Norway (as in the EU) the producers and importers are responsible for the recycling of the products. For the consumer i works like this:
If a shop sells TVs, computers and dishwashers, you can give all your old TVs, computers and dishwashers to the shop. You don't have to buy anything at the shop.
Any biz. selling any EEE (electrical and electronic equipment) have to accept for recycling the same type of things.

We have a similar thing with car tyres and battery and some other stuff...

Re:Norway has had it for years

[[Theo]]

*FIX*
As is the case with the EU.

BTW
Norway is a member of the EEA (European Economic Area) which means all the major EU directives applies...

Smelter != Incinerator

[Ritchie70]

A smelter isn't an incinerator.

A smelter is the thing that's used to take ore and turn it into usable metal. You know, like the thing in T2 that Arnold jumps into at the end.

Sounds like they've decided the easiest way to extract the metal from the electronic waste is to burn off everything that isn't metal, then separate the metals back out.

Now, there may be questions about how environmentally sound it is to burn off plastic and fiberglass, but this is definitely recycling.

Re:Smelter != Incinerator

[MechaBlue]

The smelter in Trail, BC primarily smelts lead and zinc. During this process, they also extract a lot of other metals that are present in lower quantities. Since they smelt lead, the lead in CRTs should pose no greater risk than smelting lead ore. I'm guessing that they also have the necessary equipment in place to handle mercury in ore and, as a result, should be able to handle it in electronics. I don't know much about their ability to handle the products of burning plastic but I don't think it's a stretch to think that there is a solution in place; byproducts of the smelter are already used to create fertilizer at a nearby plant.

(Supposedly) the existing smelter has everything in place to safely extract metals from the used equipment and re-integrate them into the manufacturing chain. All that's left is collection from the owners and transportation to the smelter (which is probably where the fee comes in). It's not as good as refurbishing but it's easier and probably better than letting it sit in a landfill.

As individuals, we can do a lot to help channel electronics down the refurbish path instead of the resmelt path. Organizations like craiglist and FreeMesa.org help connect people that want to give away equipment with those that want it. Some repair shops will accept old equipment because they can repair it and sell it. (I knew a guy who got $3 per dead CD-ROM drive. A repair company would buy a bunch and give them to their techs to repair instead of letting them sit idle.) Also, if you want to get involved on a larger scale, it may be possible to start or promote a swap meet or some other way of connecting people.

As a side note, the smelter in Trail has had its share of problems over the years. In particular, contamination of the surrounding areas with lead has been a major concern. However, I don't think that this program will create or exacerbate issues around the normal operation of the smelter.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trail%2C_British_Colu mbia
http://www.freemesa.org/
http://www.craigslist.org/

Re:Smelter != Incinerator

[GISGEOLOGYGEEK]

The environmental problems with the smelter in Trail are easily a couple orders of magnitude less than the environmental problems created in the chinese 'recycling' villages.

Re:Smelter != Incinerator

[EraseEraseMe]

For the record, lead levels in Trail are now the lowest in BC because of the updated processes used in the smelter, not to mention very exacting testing and monitoring of lead levels throughout children in Trail.

Other Electronics?

[PPH]

From TFA:

The list of what is acceptable for recycling is short, namely computers, printers, and TVs ? you cannot recycle personal audio players or cell phones.

So, they're supposed to take everything else and throw it into the ravine at the end of the street?

Seriously, ISTM that a recycling program which takes all electronics would be a better idea. Otherwise this other stuff will just go into a landfill.

Nightmare for vendors

[mauriceh]

Yes, we are a computer integrator/reseller in Alberta, and have had to charge these fees for a couple of years now.
Then Sask jumped on, now BC, and soon all the rest of the provinces.
But, and it is a BIG "BUTT":
We now have to collect separately for each province we sell into, report each month to each province, remit to each province
The paperwork for this equals one person-day per month for all the reporting and filing.
This is a classic example of what should have been done at the federal level, and now is more of a burden than a benefit.

Mod Parent Down

[p0tat03]

This is nothing but FUD. BC is 357,216 square miles and contains 4.3 million people (note: I did not verify the parent's numbers, but they seem reasonably correct from memory). On the other hand, California, Nevada, and Oregon put together contains 39 million people. That's almost a 10x difference.

Also remember, the population of Vancouver, Victoria, and the next 3 largest cities in BC total 2.8 million. That's 65% of the entire population of the province, with Vancouver comprising 2.1 million of the total alone. I'm pretty sure the recycling program exists THERE.

Given how dense Victoria, Vancouver, and its outlying areas is (after all, the whole region is walled in by mountains), 70 locations is not outrageous, and can in fact cover a LOT of people's recycling needs.

So take the "blatant thievery" and shove it, unless you have some real proof of a conspiracy to steal taxpayer dollars.

Re:Mod Parent Down

[theshowmecanuck]

Same thing as twinning the Port Mann and upgrading the road system for all the trucks going to the container ports within the GVRD and leaving only two lane blacktop from Alberta to the lower mainland that those same trucks have to negotiate through the Rocky Mountains. Following and or dodging trucks on two lane blacktop is not often fun... and then winter comes. The B.C. government doesn't do much for anything outside the lower mainland. It's OK to twin roads to ski resorts but... So the fact that they don't 'get' the fact that having to drive from 100 Mile House say to Kamloops to recycle your PC is ridiculous doesn't surprise me.

Re:Mod Parent Down

[kisielk]

Yeah, because it's totally viable to replicate everything that can serve a large urban area in every small town in the interior. Give me a frickin break. They're focusing on the places where it will have the largest and reduce the most waste first, not attempting to provide a center in every little corner of the province. There's probably a few orders of magnitude more computers to be recycled in the Vancouver area than places like 100 mile.

Re:Mod Parent Down

[p0tat03]

Nobody insinuated that rural residents don't have computers, or are too dumb to have computers, or any such trash. You are attacking a straw man that doesn't even exist. I suspect part of your problem with "right wing dumbasses" like myself (though I consider myself quite far left), is more so with your perception with how they think of you, rather than what they actually think of you.

The mere reality of it is that Vancouver, Victoria, and related areas are far more densely packed. A single recycling centre may take quite a bit of money to run (I'm no recycling expert), and there needs to be enough population in the area to have enough computers worth recycling. Also, I wouldn't be surprised if rural areas purchase less computers per capita, less often, than urban areas. This isn't a value judgment, nor am I theorizing why, but I suspect it is plain statistical truth.

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Another ripoff in the name of the enviro cult

[wheelgun]

If electronics were really worth recycling, private parties would gladly pay us money for said electronics. The fact that the government has to charge a compulsory fee is all one needs to know about the integrity of the recycling movement.

Re:Another ripoff in the name of the enviro cult

[the not-troll]

There are a lot of things which would be worth being done, even on the restriction that you want to be paid for it: They don't care about that is worth to be done, but about what they are made believe to be done: Recycling requires an up-front investment, thus will not be done by our beloved "think of the next quarter only and open your golden parachute" CEOs.

Also, it should be noted that e.g. scrapyards usually get paid twice: first, by the one wanting to get rid of his scrap, secondly, when the metal industry comes for raw materials (recycling scrap is much cheaper than using ore). Thus, they ain't gonna pay you money for your electronics: it would set a bad precedent.

Though in practice, it can be seen as a kind of subvention, very similar how farmers are paid in the US to grow corn - however, what is called "waste" today are the ressources of tomorrow, something which cannot be said about Monsanto corn.

Still, I must concede that maybe it would be a better idea to let them get the idea of recycling themselves when they run out of raw materials: Someday, recycling will be cheaper than mining and refining new ore, like the tar sands of Canada are slowly becoming a viable alternative to the usual oil fields due to rising prices.

Overall, this is just a case of the tragedy of the commons: corporations are only interested in privatizing profits while communalizing expenses, i.e. they want government to pay for the recycling while they reap the benefits - otherwise, they will not allow it to be done. This is exceedingly damaging to society as a whole, only benefitting a handful of investors (who, however, will someday have to learn that you can't eat money).

Just like tires and batteries

[effigoo]

I worked for a non profit computer recycling facility in the Comox Valley in BC. The reason why you would need to charge a recycling fee would be to pay the recyclers their 8bux an hour, and help cover the shipping costs of all the materials once they were sorted and packaged as best as we could. Being a non profit, we did things on the cheap and some things were not as safe as it should have been (like crushing monitor glass). I know that if we had more money, things would have been done with more concern for safety (breathing in old photocopier toner and monitor glass dust is pretty terrifying... I am pretty sure my little paper mask didn't save the day)

Ewaste is a huge problem. There are many dangerous chemicals in electronics and without a place to properly dispose of them, it goes to the landfill. Our main goals were to keep it out of the landfill, and keep it out of China. We sent most of our sorted recyclables to Vancouver to a prison that had a computer recycling program (for further sorting), and from there they went all over north America.

There is NOT A LOT OF MONEY in this. Plastic sold for a few cents a pound, and was a huge hassle to package and ship. Sure, you can say "what about the gold on the processors" but computers are mostly steel and plastic, and very little gold. Sadly that little operation shut down due to lack of funding. This program is exactly what BC needs. People don't think about their waste in this disposable society, and if it takes money to make them consider it, I say it's worth it. This sort of tax is similar to the car battery or tire tax, the money just helps keep the programs funded to properly dispose of the waste.

Just another "Fear Me!" article from the ignorant.

[GISGEOLOGYGEEK]

Everyone be scared! Everyone scream at the evil things portrayed in the article! ... Or, instead you can educate yourself.

Generally people have no clue what happens in the mining industry, how metals are actually extracted from the ground and refined. I LOVE it when I see people protesting the mining industry in general, while using their cell phones, full of metals, while wearing clothes that were made on metal machines, with their metal car or bike parked nearby. They have no clue. It's great fun showing them the irony of their actions.

This ignorant FUD article is no different.

If it wasn't for smelters, the computer parts being recycled would never have existed in the first place! but people read the headlines and just assume the worst.

What happens when you recycle a pop can? ... it gets melted down in a smelter.
What happens when your car is recycled? ... it gets melted down in a smelter.
What happens when to pretty much any metal product when it is no longer useful? ... it gets melted down in a smelter.

It's about time the same happened to computer parts.

The government of British Columbia used to sell surplus computers and monitors as scrap.

The news media here caused great embarassment to the BC government a few years ago when they exposed the fact that the scrap ended up in the shocking Chinese 'recycle' system we've all seen on TV ... where peasants smash and burn the parts in the open air of their villages and manually stir vats of acids filled with the metallic ashes to recover the metals, where they let all the chemicals run down the streets into the local soils and water sources.

So the BC government actually did something about it.

Smelting it here in BC in a controlled manner where emissions are regulated, where thousands of people will NOT have their lives greatly shortened by the process, where ground water, lakes, rivers, and soil will NOT be destroyed by the process, sounds like a much better system to me.

Re:so much for liberal paradise huh

[GISGEOLOGYGEEK]

The fee occurs when you BUY the product.

Dumbass.

Re:Just another tax grab

[GISGEOLOGYGEEK]

Perhaps the people of BC wouldn't be taxed so much if the former NDP government hadn't spent 10 years unionizing everything, destroying the BC economy by ruining all investor confidence in the resource industries, and more than doubling our provincial debts by spending $20 Billion more than they had while claiming their budgets were balanced (recall the 'fudget budgets'?).

If it weren't for the current liberal government (despite their own flaws) running the province as a business instead of as a socialist welfare state, provincial bankrupcy would be the problem in BC, not high taxation.

Paging Dr. Junk!

[spaceyhackerlady]

The outfit I work for went from 500 people to about 20 when the bubble burst, and we had a lot of surplus stuff to get rid of. We ended up selling lots of cool-looking flashing-light junk to movie people for props, cherry-picked a bit for ourselves, and sold the rest to a local guy who specializes in industrial cleanup. He ground up most of it (circuit boards and things) to extract the metals. We promptly christened him Dr. Junk.

Before he got the boards (some quite valuable in their time) we made sure, with a hammer and an anvil, that the boards wouldn't make it back in to service. Downsizing can have its rewards. :-)

...laura

Re:Paging Dr. Junk!

[that this is not und]

Before he got the boards (some quite valuable in their time) we made sure, with a hammer and an anvil, that the boards wouldn't make it back in to service.

It was might kind of you to make sure it was nothing but raw slag before you turned it loose for anybody else to recover.

Sort of the equivalent of the 'rich people' in a poor country making sure to lace all food waste with poison before pitching it out, because otherwise poor people might might get use from it.

Re:Paging Dr. Junk!

[spaceyhackerlady]

It was might kind of you to make sure it was nothing but raw slag before you turned it loose for anybody else to recover.

Get a clue. Please.

We didn't do it because we were nasty. We did it because if the boards were genuinely scrapped, with no possibility of re-entering commercial service, we got a big tax writeoff. The accountants and tax people are sometimes picky about this.

Besides, it was fun.

...laura

The Collective Good

[Tmack]

http://www.collectivegood.com/

They re-use old cellphones, pagers, crackberries, etc, by repairing your old phone and then give them to charities. Non-working ones at the least have their batteries recycled. They also have kits available to setup colection stations at your work or elsewhere, and I have seen several collection stations setup that look like USPS mailboxes repainted. Ive sent a few phones their way in the past. Its better than just throwing them out or letting them sit around!

Tm

Re:Just another "Fear Me!" article from the ignora

[creativeHavoc]

If I had mod points I would use them for you buddy, instead all you get is my admiration on a post well done.

+1 notastupidsheep modifier

Re:Just another "Fear Me!" article from the ignora

[qdaku]

Being a geological engineer working in the mining industry... the public doesn't have a clue, I agree. Having done a bit of work in landfills and subsurface contamination, again, people have no clue. Nice to know there's someone else out there.

Mod parent up - nicely said

[fantomas]

Well said. Over here in the UK it's called Nimby-ism - Not In My Back Yard (which suggests the expression might have come from over the pond).

People have to grow up and realise throwing away stuff has consequences. Well done to BC for taking responsibility of their own rubbish rather than messing up some third world country with it.

As an aside, I heard that its becoming more profitable to recycle scrap than to mine for some metals, is this true? As in, it's cheaper to melt down and process X weight of processor boards to get 100 grams of gold than it would be to dig Y tons of ore out the ground, crush it, pour in cyanide, dispose of the toxic waste, etc.. Can you comment?

Re:Mod parent up - nicely said

[the not-troll]

Another important example besides gold would be aluminium, where melting it out of the ore requires, if I remember correctly, about twenty times the energy used for recycling.

Belgium does this since 2001

[philfr]

It's called recupel http://www.recupel.be/

Printing money is taxation, kinda

[TheLink]

"Remember that the state can print as much money as it likes, so taxation is purely to keep the overall amount of money out there from spiralling upwards"

Actually printing money is a form of taxation. Whoever gets to print the money taxes the rest who don't. Think about it.

It is a great advantage to the USA that so many countries trade in US dollars, and many keep billions of it in reserve. A vast amount of USD is outside the USA.

1) The US Gov can print more money and automatically "tax" everyone else (including other countries!) by reduce the value of the USD. Remember the prices of lots of international stuff are in USD and it takes a while between "more money printed" and "people to figure out the USD has gone down in value".
2) The USA doesn't need to keep reserves of other country's currencies

Remember: you can also "print money" by issuing IOUs. The US Gov issues a lot of these and Japan, China etc buy them (after all what can they do with the excess billions of USD they earn from selling stuff to the USA? They sure don't spend as much as the US). The US then promptly buys more stuff from them ;).

It's a weird scheme that's probably going to blow up eventually, but so far it's lasted longer than the other strange schemes :).

It'll probably last longer if more of the money just kept circling about between USA, Japan and China, and less was "burnt" in Iraq etc.

But what do I know, I'm not an economist.

Having done the taxes for many people I work with

[way2trivial]

I can tell you, I was SHOCKED TO DEATH the first time I did some with earned income credit.

Some people genuinely do have negative tax return figures, and when filing, get more than they paid in over the year- a net negative for federal over the year.

Alberta already has e-waste fees

[iamghetto]

They are as follows:

Television (18" and smaller) $15.00
Television (19"- 29") $25.00
Television (30" - 45") $30.00
Television (46" and larger) $45.00
CPUs (including mouse, keyboard, cables, speakers.) $10.00 (basically, $10 for your entire computer)
Printers/printer combos $8.00
Laptops/electronic notebooks $5.00
Computer monitors $12.00

http://www3.gov.ab.ca/env/waste/ewaste/index.html

And if it means all these electronics are going to be recycled/reused in a more efficient manner, I have no problems with theses fees. It's better than my broken 50" TV or desktop computer getting buried in the earth. Most of the fees are incidental compared to the total purchase price of the goods anyways.

Externalisation/Externalization

[MrKaos]

I wrote about this in my journal http://hardware.slashdot.org/~MrKaos/journal/17736 7 in the context of Global Warming.

The electronic's industry offsets the "cost" of their externalities onto the community, the government is effectivley subsidising the cost of handling waste products by sanctioning release (by burning) of toxic chemicals. We either pay for the externality via toxic pollution or increased price of products to cater for the waste re-processing. For example if industry had to pay for the damage caused by releasing these chemicals then perhaps recovering resources like Coltan http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coltan from that waste would become viable. Instead the risk of litigation is considered.

Surely it would make sense to recover resources from the waste products when they are gathered in one place, especially if you have sufficient volume of e-waste.