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What's the Best Way to Recycle Old Tech in the US?
Tim Danhamn writes "SmartPlanet.com, a green-focused Web site, has put up an article about the best way to recycle your old tech, including local recycling centers and reusing old technology in other ways. I'm about to upgrade to a new PC and I have a lot of old radios, MP3 players and other electronic goods lying around the house. The article though is mostly about solutions in the UK, so I want to know - what is the best way to recycle old tech in the US?"
I don't think I've ever had a monitor or computer make it through the night without a 'dumpster' diver type grabbing it for themselves....
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Most recyclers will take circuit boards (PCB's) and give you decent money for them. They melt them down to get all the copper out. Copper is not cheap.
Freecycle is unbelievable.
Every time we have listed something, I said to myself "there is no way anyone wants that crap." And every time we immediately get multiple takers.
We listed the plants in a flowerbed we were going to pave over and within a couple of days someone came to our house, dug them out and carted them off.
So having several MythTV boxen is suddenly a bad idea?
Just throw it away, i.e. put it a properly sealed landfill. Someday someone will come along with a Plasma Gasification rig (google it) and distill it into its component materials safely and efficiently. Recycling is just a waste of time and money, whether its your time and money or someone else's.
Some people take old electronics and make sculptures out of it. This lady makes moving animals out of old electronics junk. If I also recall there was a guy back in the early 2000's that made a life-size dinosaur sculpture out of old electronics gear...I couldn't find a link to it though, I think I saw it in Wired Mag. Apparently the point of the dinosaur was to represent how much electronics junk the average American consumed in their lifetime. I am sure there are plenty of other examples of such a thing.
I was in Tokyo this summer and met a woman from Hong Kong who was giving a presentation at the university on how polluted areas of China are getting because of all the computer trash. The United States and Japan are the two worst offenders of this.
China's idea of "recycling" is having lower income people burn the old parts in open drums to reclaim the metals. This process dumps tons of burned plastic residue, PCB's and metals such as mercury all over the local landscape. There are areas of China that are becoming almost inhabitable. Birth defects are increasing. The study she did went so far as to measure the significant increase in these chemicals in breast milk.
For most of these chemicals they were tracking, the only places in the world that higher concentrations in the environment were in areas of Taiwan where a lot of this is manufactured.
From a financial perspective US companies that are moving manufacturing to China are not really saving any money on the manufacturing costs. (My wife worked in the finance department for a major power tool manufacturer and others have shared similar stories) Where they are saving money is in not having to provide all the controls and filters that the EPA is requiring at their facilities. The Chinese government has been willing to sell the future health of the country in the name of economic progress. And American companies are all too willing to oblige.
I took a three old laptop batteries to my local Radio Shack where they advertise free recycling for your old rechargeable batteries.
The guy behind the counter said, "That's fine, but if you really care about recycling, just know that if you leave them here, they'll go into the trash. I've never seen the battery recycle bin go anywhere else." I was astounded. I thanked him for his honesty and kept the batteries.
What's your experience with free recycling of batteries and the like at Radio Shack or other retailers?