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States Push Makers' Role In Disposing of Electronic Waste
AaronParsons writes "An interesting NY Times article describes currently available programs for post-consumer electronics. One of the many interesting points in the article is that electronics manufacturers should be held responsible for recycling their products post-consumer: 'Maybe since they have some responsibility for the cleanup, it will motivate them to think about how you design for the environment and the commodity value at the end of the life.'"
I live in Washington and take my old computers to RePC. They charge a fee, $5 to $10 a unit that depends entirely on the labor to rip it apart into its "differently recycled pieces." They have huge heaps of PCBs in one pile, metal caes in another, I assume crushable plastic was hiding behind those.
If you get the federal government involved they will put a tax on the manufacturers (which we will pay for our new toys), and then they'll go spend it elsewhere (e.g. social security). That's inane. I'm sorry the mega-corps have to deal with all the state laws, but they have lawyers for that sort of thing already.
Even if the money collected were in a closed loop, (which it won't be), having the consumer put the five dollar bills in the hands of the company doing the work seems vastly more efficient than anything that we could do with "national taxes by weight/volume/content," "recycling-prepaid" stamps and typical regulation details.
I find it interesting that we're willing to push this as an ad hoc solution but not a paradigm. Maybe all manufacturers should be forced to take responsibility for the amount of waste their products generate, not just the makers of soda cans & computers?
Wouldn't this be a good idea for all products? The only downside I see is higher prices, but I think the motivation companies have of cutting costs would benefit the world.
"Only one thing, is impossible for god: to find any sense in any copyright law on the planet." Mark Twain
One of the many interesting points in the article is that electronics manufacturers should be held responsible for recycling their products post-consumer: 'Maybe since they have some responsibility for the cleanup, it will motivate them to think about how you design for the environment and the commodity value at the end of the life.'"
How the crap do you do that? Lets see, Intel makes a top of the line CPU called the Core i7, however within 3 years, that CPU will be considered mid to low end. So what is Intel to do? Stop making CPUs until they manage to make the fastest one ever then abandon the CPU market? Heck, most of the waste was caused by the government mandating the DTV switch. Technology evolves independent of the manufacturer.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
You tree huggers can vote me down all you want but, you know that this is bullshit!
Where does this BS end? McDonalds to be held responsible for the recycling of cups and bags? GM to be held responsible for the recycling of their cars?
Sure it sounds great to you because it doesn't inconvenience you, yet. I suppose that you will continue to turn a blind eye to the reality of this until you yourself are held responsible for something that you create and sell on but, must recycle years later.
The company has sold the product to a new owner. The owner of the product is responsible for its disposal! Quit chewing granola for just long enough to face reality.
This idea seems solid, tell me what I'm missing.
So we have a pile of old laptops that we need to recycle. We dump them in one of those industrial shredders that reduce them to powder. We run the powder through centrifuges to separate the pieces by weight. This part's probably the really, really complicated bit but the end result is purified feedstock to put back into the manufacturing process. Here's the aluminum, here's the old bits of plastic, and so forth.
Obviously, if this were really cheap and economical the companies would be doing it already, they wouldn't be going out to get fresh feedstock. So, I take it the crushing and separating just isn't economical yet? Or is it not even quite technically possible?
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
Bah, this has been common in Europe for some years. Also, where I live, if your dispose of your electronics properly you get to pay less garbage collection tax.
.. to move production overseas.
Fact is, that in most parts of the U.S., land is abundant and cheap compared to the problems posed by recycling problematic and impure materials like electronics. Recycling is a pollution prone process at best, more so when chemical separation steps are involved. The zen-like aesthetic appeal of a closed system of recycling doesn't match reality. Goods like these can, at best, be "downcycled" into products of considerably lower utility and value
In the post-RoHS, post-CRT era, electronics are no more problematic a waste than those Rubbermaid laundry baskets people buy.
People throw their old hardware away?
Sheesh. I still have a couple of 300 meg drives sitting around for posterity.
He who has no
Kind of makes planned obsolescence come back to bite the manufacturer in the ass, doesn't it?
The end user will be the one paying for it in the long run anyway.
We need to start treating it like one.
Well I agree with the idea of recycling but a new paradigm is needed. We as a species consume way too much which creates way too much waste. Around 1% of all consumer goods are disposed of within months after purchase. We are in need of a cycle that is more symbiotic and less parasitic towards the earth.
Currently, product waste is an "externality" - the cost of recycling/disposing of the product is borne by someone other than the manufacturer. When buying a new item, virtually all consumers don't take into account the cost of disposal, but it still needs to be paid.
Making the manufacturers responsible for recycling/disposal of their products means that they will need to increase their price to the consumer, thereby showing the true cost of the product at purchase time.
BTW, I'm told New Zealand currently has a similar law (for all products, not just electronics), and it works quite well.
Is what it really means. So the state doesn't want to be liable for what is in their landfills and as such passes the responsibility onto manufacturers because the state cannot go after every consumer but can damn well go after a manufacture. As such costs go up as everyone pays for the small percentage of people tossing stuff wrongly.
It is an easy sale for governments, big bad evil companies versus poor little school children drinking polluted water.
Just like the deposit tax on bottles, we all pay it, but who benefits? Supposedly all of us, but who gets the money and who benefits by it not being done?
I have no problem with manufactures being encouraged to make cleaner products, I do have a problem by the lies foisted onto the public how its the manufacturers responsibility to ensure disposal of the device after its use. How long before the disposal becomes a requirement by law? These laws can eventually turned into a system where all we do is lease everything we use because the manufacture can use government mandates stating that product "X" must be turned in NOW because the state claims that something about it doesn't fit current environmental laws, all at the behest of some good lobbying.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
Paper made from hemp is better for the environment, but we all know that some greedy asshole paper barons had some well paid for lobbyists to make sure their income didn't diminish. Now we have a fake war on drugs as a way to make even more money. If anything, recycling should be made illegal, the feds should create a NREA (no-recycling enforcement agency) for the sake of the all-mighty dollar!
I hope this would encourage factories to keep producing something that could handle some beatings. Just like my current Nokia 3310. I've lost count of how many mobiles my friends have changed because their old ones are dead (like, one dead every year or two). I missed the old days where things are built to last.
Manufactures already have programs to take back their junk in order to comply with the WEEE EU directive. This has been law now for more than 5 years. Rather than discussing this idea as something theoretical lawmakers in the US would be well advised to study if an how this works in Europe.
earth is a closed loop system
So the earth will receive the feedback we're giving it and react to come to a new equilibrium? Wouldn't the earth be an open loop system?
Yea, it's easy to not think about it and blame the mean old corporations. It's not my fault that I bought a computer and now regard it as garbage. It's the manufacturer's fault, right? They should be responsible. Plus I don;t want to spend mY money disposing of this "garbage".
Think for just a micro second. Please! What do you think the manufacturers are going to do? They are going to raise the price of their products to cover the cost. Then they are going to add an addition "disposal fee" or tax. You are going to pay for it and thanks to legislation you'll pay way more than if you simply recycled it your self.
This is DUMB but, the epidemic lack of thought will sink this nation.
Now, compare that process to the man-made process of building, say, a computer. From the dust, we assembles a computer. After it becomes old and useless, we bury it in a landfill. The computer does not decompose and does not return to the dust. Worse, some of the junk that we bury in these landfills actually poison the land.
Clearly, man-made processes contain only 1 part of the 2-part process. That 1 part is the composition. Man-made processes have traditionally not involved decomposition.
In order for us to be truly "green", we should mimic nature and should always use a 2-part process: composition and decomposition. Each product that we buy must be designed to facilitate the often neglected 2nd part: decomposition. Of course, we, as consumers, should pay the full cost of both parts. Right now, we typically pay just the 1st part: composition. Indeed, the ultra-cheap $600 computer produced by slave labor in China would likely cost $1200 if we included the cost of decomposition.
This issue is not mere idle philosophy. When we finally exhaust all the available copper and other metals in the mines, we must dig up all the crap in the landfills and recycle it to extract the metals. This recycling is the aforementioned decomposition. We eventually must pay the cost of decomposition.
I'm no "tree hugger", but the overall idea makes perfect logical sense. Your argument that the new "Owner" of the product should be held responsible leads back to the buyer beware attitude. The company producing the product *MUST* be held accountable for the environmental impacts the product has. This is not a "tree hugger" issue any longer. This is about the quality of the environment and ecosystem that the human race needs to sustain itself and how unchecked population growth and consumerism is affecting it.
I'm sorry, but making the disposal of a product that contains toxic or environmentally harmful components the sole responsibility of the consumer is patently irresponsible. It is also irresponsible for a company to knowingly produce a product that contains difficult to dispose of (safely) components and provide no guidance or assistance to the consumer. It may be easy for a person living in a metro area the size of Seattle, Los Angeles, Dallas or Atlanta to find a firm that recycles electronics waste, but for a large segment of the population there aren't such facilities nearby or they are unknown because they don't advertise well. Disposing of these products in landfills is not acceptable, unless you are planning on starting a business in the future to mine landfills for precious commodities and mitigate the toxins in them. Let me know how that turns out for you.
Your entitled to your own opinions on this subject, but be prepared to defend them if they are clearly self-serving, ignorant or otherwise indifferent to the well being of us all. The bottom line is we can't keep operating the way we have been and everyone--including big corporations, governments and private citizens--needs to be more responsible. If you think the taxes to do this will be steep, just imagine the penalties for not doing this. Look beyond your own nose, backyard, five minutes into the future, etc. This disposable everything mentality has got to stop, folks!
There's one way that recycling can be done profitably for the retailer - let them have bins so we can strip the excess packaging off our purchases. Pre-sorted, easily sellable packaging materials (cardboard and paper, plastic, etc).
They'd make a profit off it AND get the "feel-good" greenies.
If this is what it takes to return the United States to a proper service economy instead of the rampant consumerism we've had forced down our throats for the last 30+ years, then I'm all for it because I'd personally be willing to spend a bit more for a product that can be repaired easily and that doesn't fall apart the day after the warranty expires unlike the crap I've seen for the last decade.
Mod me up/Mod me down: I wont frown as I've no crown
There is a lot of money in recycling - the industry continues to grow. Don't tell me that this effort needs to cost anybody anything aside a few extra acres for a new company with new jobs. Anything else is an excuse for raping the public in some nefariously placed capitalistic manner.
Further, as a people, we have every-right to mandate laws that will help reduce the waste stream and provide a better quality of live for our citizens. Its not big government - its clean air and water so we don't die via poisoning ourselves. There is no room for the big-government argument here. Mandate recyclable, non-toxic materials, and let a new industry make a profit from it - maybe then China cant sell us bad paint, poisoned toys and sheetrock, etc... and we actually retain our health and American prosperity instead.
And its noted in several posts that companies are already doing this on their own - with their own initiatives because they are tired of the same old arguments as well; Moreover they realize there is great money in it with no need to rape the consumer further than they do already.
To Hell with the disposable generation - the industrial age must grow up and realize its not about consumables as much as its about sustainability. A new, Green economy needs to also consider durable and non-durable goods alike.
Apple will take any of their old hardware off your hands and recycle it/dispose of it correctly- just drop it off at an Apple Store. If you're trying to dispose of an old iPod, they'll give you a discount towards the purchase of a new one. Apparently they also recycle stuff from other manufacturers if you buy a new replacement item from them.
Amazon also has a recycling program available for their Kindles- you mail it in and they take care of it from there.
I'm pretty sure Sony has a similar program for their many electronics offerings.
I personally would only take advantage of these programs if the device in question was completely borked. An old iPod or computer can be resold easily enough on craigslist or eBay, but a nonfunctional one is just junk, and I have enough of that in my house as it is.
Some links:
http://www.apple.com/environment/recycling/
http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=200197550
http://www.panasonic.com/environmental/recycling-electronic.asp
http://www.sonystyle.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/CategoryDisplay?catalogId=10&storeId=10151&langId=-1&categoryId=8198552921644513777
The whole point of the disposable market is for the makers of products to keep making money. And now with a Global economy, this rings even more true. I'm not against the notion of better disposal of products, but we certainly would have way less of an issue if products were made to last alot longer.
One product that is rather irksome is the lightbulb. There are those new lightbulbs that are made to emit less heat and last have a much longer lifespan, and consumers are finding that the life span is less than a typical light bulb and now the product (the one I'm thinking of) contains a lot of Mercury in it. In this global economy, if we purchase such a light bulb from China, how would we hold the makers responsible for cleanup? They will just turn around and charge a higher price right back onto the consumer.
It's an ugly cycle.
Life takes interesting turns, but the most interest is when you're off the beaten path.
(...) It makes no sense for companies to have to recycle things that they made years down the line. There are some things that /will/ go obsolete no matter how "green" you design them.(...)
It's not about not making things obsolete. It's ultimately about the consumer paying the full cost of the object they purchase, instead of saddling the rest of society with it. If my 1 cent product packaging costs 10 cents to dispose of, it should cost 11 cents.
Currently, product waste is an "externality" - the cost of recycling/disposing of the product is borne by someone other than the manufacturer.
Yeah, externalities, essentially, dumping your dog's crap in your neighbor's yard hoping they won't notice.
Cradle-to-cradle describes the process of designing for full lifecyle. McDonough distinguishes "re-cycling" from "down-cycling" the process we generally use today that recycles plastics such at PET into playground equipment and fleece.
Designing for re-use, disassembly, and re-use gives companies such as Interface a competitive advantage while reducing externalities.
Free markets can be good at this, but externalities must be internalize, or it is simply not a free market. This is a valid role for governments, working to ensure a level playing field that doesn't give anyone an unfair right to abuse the commons. Once that level playing field is established, eliminating perverse subsidies, smart companies *will* go to more cradle-to-cradle designs because it makes great sense on so many levels.
Gotta love Slashdot... someone makes an honest, intelligent point that goes against the Green/Liberal/Anti-Government/Anti-Corporation mindset and they're instantly modded FLAMEBAIT.
Please, he makes a good point: Why should manufacturers be charged for materials that they have given up all rights and ownership to?
So if a person refuses to recycle something, it's somehow the manufacturer's fault? How is the manufacturer supposed to know or control whether the consumer lets their product rot on a shelf for 10 years or throw it into a river two days later?
By charging the manufacturer for how the consumer disposes of their product, you are now granting them the _responsibility_ to take charge of how the consumer disposes of it, which is nearly impossible to enforce with Orwellian-style RFID tags in every product.
What exactly are any of you suggesting that the manufacturers do different, or is this just a way to milk some more easy money from those 'fat corporate pigs?'
If this is what it takes to return the United States to a proper service economy instead of the rampant consumerism...
If that was what it took then it may well be a good thing. But, all historical evidence indicates that it's FAR more likely to simply raise cost and increase governmental interference while still churning out the same old stuff. Hoping that something is good doesn't make it so. All the optimism in the world won't alter reality. Surely you've figured that out by now.
Toilet paper manufacturers should be held responsible for recycling their products post-consumer...
Ghana: Digital Dumping Ground http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/stories/ghana804/
We get the whole "balanced" yin/yang of making the purchase of electronic devices contain "fees for the totality of all possible negative social and economic impacts to the society and the world."
It's a grand idea. Every attempt to implement such things at a federal level has been a battle against inefficiency, corruption and greed. Using New Zealand as an example, given that they have 1/9th of the population of California doesn't seem to address the scalability issues involved in a national implementation in the US. It might be a good model for one of the smaller states to implement, especially if they were an island.
The GPs point is that we have system that works. It may need improvements, but getting heavy federal government regulation involved won't help. The added overhead (not counting the money that the purposefully reappropriate), will increase the costs. That's how you motivate people to cheat. It's a pressure problem.
How many of your friends would pirate their music if the legitimate purchase was as easy as iTunes, and 25 cents a song? Zero, maybe 1 in a 100?
At 50 cents?
At 99 cents?
At 17.99 and you have to buy the whole damned album for the three songs you want?
Whether or not it's "just and right" to infringe the copyright of these companies, they created the economic pressure that spawned their competition.
Don't do the same here. Don't double the cost of doing something everyone wants to do right, and thereby motivate people to cheat. That's not a win for the planet no matter how "green" you may feel when voting for those laws.
Maybe since they have some responsibility for the cleanup, it will motivate them to think about how you design for the environment and the commodity value at the end of the life
Huh? Whose responsibility is it to design what??
-dZ.
Carol vs. Ghost
In The Netherlands, when you buy something like a TV, computer, washing machine, etc. you have to pay a 'removal fee' ("Verwijderingsbijdrage"). e.g. a refrigerator carries a 18 fee, a DVD recorder a 3 fee, etc. The money gained this way is put to use especially on dealing with recycling electric/electronic products. It doesn't cover the bills, afaik, but it helps and keeps more generic taxes (municipal waste taxes, for example) down.
In addition, even for electric/electronic devices on which there is no such fee (such as mp3 players, etc.*), you can trade your old machine in when getting a new one. You're not getting a lower price that way (short of retailers' own decisions), but you -are- rid of the old machine without having to pay recycling charges yourself, dealing with transport, etc. So if you have a CRT TV and want to get a nice new LCD.. drop the CRT off at the retailer and it has become their problem.
This arrangement got some negative-turned-positive press a few years ago; some whiney newspaper reported figured out that a lot of these retailers were taking these trade-ins, refurbishing them, and selling them as 2nd hand (national and abroad). "Oh noes, what abuse!", right? Except most people figured 'good on them! better to see the things getting a 2nd life than ending up chopped for parts and the rest dumped on the landfills'.
* personally I'd be all for putting a fee on small electronics as well; especially cellphones, as people in NL seem to think you -need- a new phone every 4-8 months.
A big theme in the DRM threads is that once you buy something, it is yours to do as your please. The necessary flip side of that is that it is your responsibility after that -- not the manufacturer's, and not whoever you bought it from. Making manufacturers responsible for ultimate disposal necessarily gives them an interest in control of the device throughout it's lifecycle. And that's a bad thing.
BMW does send new cars to the crushers to find out if they are easy enough to take apart for recycling and where the problems are.
Some composites, materials or constructions are not easy to separate hindering recycling. There it makes sense that the manufacturer keeps recycling in mind - and what better method than to force them to take back what they produce, and process it in a responsible manner, or to make the life that much longer (like a lot of GSM phones are traded to 3rd world countries; a world standard can do that for you).
A lot of the stuff that's getting thrown away still works! Even if it doesn't someone might want the parts. Before sending it to some recycling company which will probably send most of it to third world kids to cook the lead out over an open hotplate, give it to someone who can use it.
You could...
Currently, product waste is an "externality" - the cost of recycling/disposing of the product is borne by someone other than the manufacturer. When buying a new item, virtually all consumers don't take into account the cost of disposal, but it still needs to be paid.
And it IS paid by me the consumer with my municipal waste fees. If you buy my used car for $1, then its disposal is your fucking problem. If you buy my new car for $100,000, same fucking deal. If we need to nudge people in the right direction for this reason or that, then whatever. But don't pretend like you know dick about "externalities". You don't. A true externality would be the noise of the manufacturing facility. That is trivial. With a transfer of ownership, the item's disposal has no externality as that is 100% the responsibility of the purchaser (who may create externalities themselves). Just because it is a cost not paid by the manufacturer, does not make it an externality. Fucking morons here...
I usually take them to Best Buy, just because I really hate the place and the management. I normally walk them into the customer service desk and set it in front or on top, tell the worker I'll be right back and just leave. I've never had anyone question me, heck, half the time they pretend not to even notice you so they don't have to deal with you. I like to imagine the look on their face at closing time when someone realizes that the item is not even a model they stock.
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
Interesting ideas. I always through the term "recycling" was misleading because usually it's impossible to make the -same- item again. Recycling a plastic bottle should mean making -other bottles-, not some puke-gray ergonomically horrific park bench (just how many of those does the world actually need?) Of course, entropy being what it is, I don't expect anybody to be able to make a perfect one-to-one conversion, but most 'recycling' efforts don't even try. Other examples: used tires being ground into playground mulch, newspapers being turned into paper towels. These approaches are a nice start, but still, the material is basically being 'down-cycled' and eventually reaches a level where it's going to end up as landfill anyway.
Where is Mr. Fusion when we need him!
RETURN without GOSUB in line 1050
Safe recycling and disposal is necessary, and everyone has a role to play. Manufacturers should not be wholly responsible for the disposal of their products, for they are not the only player. Everybody involved needs to be responsible for areas where they can improve the situation. There is no point making anybody responsible for things that they cannot influence. But, the flip side is that it is completely right to make people responsible for what they do have influence over, if they are deriving benefit. It's absurd to argue that a company should have no responsibility for products they no longer own - companies whom advertise no warranty nonetheless have one imposed by law. Companies are still liable for the safe design of their products.
Thus, manufacturers should be responsible and held accountable for how easily their products can be recycled and safely disposed. Councils/counties/whoever need to be responsible for accessible, convenient collection. Consumers need to be responsible for sorting through their refuse and depositing it properly. The thing is, councils are already incentivised to do their job (it costs them to dispose of waste) and given the facilities, it's turning out that consumers are happy to do their bit. I doubt manufacturers should be given the job of actually recycling and disposing of their products, because it is not their area of expertise. Specialist companies are likely to be simply better at it. But there needs to be a direct link between the ease of recycling and the manufacturer, because they are whom is best able to influence it.
I imagine that if this happens, it will be just like CRV tax on bottles here in California. Every beverage bottle we buy here has a CRV cost attached to it. That cost can be recouped by recycling the bottle. Very few people end up recycling the bottles so they eat the CRV (usually about five cents a container). I can see the same thing happening with "eWaste". There will be a $10 or $20 fee tacked onto the price of everything. The manufacturers will say that they have done their part to offset the cost of recycling their products. Most consumers won't bother recycling the hardware any more than they do today. A few people will fill up pickup trucks with old computers and take them to the recycling center a few times a week.
...I really don't understand how people rationalize that manufacturers should be responsible for disposing of the goods that they manufacture. That is not their role. They are called "manufacturers" because that is exactly what they do, they manufacture things. They make products for you to buy, and if, at some indeterminate point in the future, you decide that you no longer want that product, or that product stops functioning and it is not economical / practical / wise to have it fixed, the onus should be placed upon you or someone else to responsibly dispose of it.
I'll just go ahead and get it out of the way right now, that I am not the most environmentally-minded person ever, in fact I probably group in with the least environmentally-minded people. That said, I think the degree to which the government is regulating environmental friendliness is kind of out-of-hand, it seems nowadays that "for the environment" is almost as strong a motivator / excuse as "for the children", except it's perceived as "okay" because all they're taking is our convenience and money, not our freedoms. For example, where I live they recently passed a by-law that it is illegal to sit with your car idling, which I feel is totally ridiculous. If I want to wait for someone to be ready to be picked up, or if I want to just run into the house, or any of a myriad of things, and leave my car running for some reason (convenience, keep the A/C going, whatever) then it's my car, and my gas. I pay for the maintenance on the car, and I pay for the fuel, so it should be all the power to me. Now I haven't had any sort of run in with any over-zealous cop actually enforcing said by-law, but I can see the day coming. Needless to say, this by-law isn't changing my behaviour, it's just going to make me pay a fine down the road, and how does that really help the environment?
Those things do decompose-- just too slowly. Man really has become too proud. He thinks he is powerful enough to create something the Earth cannot eventually reclaim.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
I live in Wake County, NC. I pay my county taxes and as a benefit I get the North Wake Multi-Material Drop Off Site.
http://www.wakegov.com/recycling/business/multimaterialdropoff.htm
Why should I be paying another tax when I already have this?
Post anonymously - For when your opinion embarrasses even you!
Actually, your typical soda bottle IS recycled back into bottles, the PET it's made from is much to expensive to not reclaim.
For someone in the recycling industry, electronics recycling has become politically desirable but economically it's gone down the drain. When we started investigating reclamation of material from electronics in the early nineties, most of the electronics were literal gold mines, after evaporating off the plastic and separating off the metals you had a sand with 1% gold in some cases. That process paid for itself and was profitable if you got the scale, without dumping fees. Nowadays, the precious metal content has dropped so far to require dumping fees to make it work, and that only if you don't live in CA (where you can't do it period due to environmental regulations). What you see today is mainly recovery of the metal content, and the rest gets dumped into the landfill, or is "stored" until the right technology becomes available (or better until someone pays you to make the pile of scrap disappear).
I'm aging rapidly, I bought a new game and had no idea if my machine was good for it.
I would characterize this debate as having X camps:
1) The "it's my right to chuck anything I want into the garbage, and government can't tell me not to" camp.
2) The "government has no right to define a manufacturer's responsibilities, nor to compel them to meet them" camp.
3) The "whatever the product is, it's gonna be here 10,000 more years (approximately) than it will be used for, and this is frakkin' insane, unsustainable, and very likely the thing that is going to overwhelm and destroy us much sooner than we choose to think" camp.
I'm all for telling government to sod off, but seriously folks, we're already drowning in trash, and the rate at which we are committing suicide is increasing. Maybe, just maybe, this is one of those issues that government exists to address? I mean we, as social animals, do create societies -- rather than living as a bunch of feral lone islands -- for a reason.
If law makers like this idea, we should first make lawmakers responsible for all the pollution produced by their work. If some law, after it is applied by society and mangled by various judicial interpretations over the space of several years ends-up having negative effects, we should be able to drag the retired lawmakers out of their nursing homes, and make them clean things up...at their expense.
Somehow I doubt there'd be too many legislators willing to support such a plan in their field of work...
If this nuttiness gets applied to electronics, then it should be applied to EVERYTHING that eventually becomes waste (cars, food, furniture, clothing, houses, airplanes, etc.) Slashdotters ought to be smart enough to see that this has NOTHING to do with toxicity levels or mass in landfills and EVERYTHING to do with government seeking power and control over all aspects of "dangerous" technologies like computers. Governments do not like technologies that enable individuals to push back against governments. If any maker of electronic products must be able to recover the products and recyle them, then no small companies will be able to get into the business; only big corporations (which usually are willing to get in bed with the politicians in order to protect their profits) will be able to be in the business and THEY will implement whatever security schemes, DRM, etc the government instructs them to implement (recall the big phone companies and wiretaps?)
In Europe we have two sets of pertinent directives, one on waste electrical equipment (WEEE Directive), one on packaging. Both are designed to make the producer of the end product (not the components therein) responsible for the costs of disposal and recycling
Since the EU is an huge market for all producers of such products, the design requirements are already built in to comply with this and several other directives, notable recently is RoHS, which banned amongst other things, lead in most solders, and certain bromide fire retardants. It's not economical for manufacturers to produce multiple versions of products, so they will seek to minimise the number of versions as much as possible, and indeed, most electrical equipment sold in the US today complies with all pertinent EU directives on waste management, recyclability, chemical composition etc. I can buy servers from the US and they'll arrive CE marked with RoHS compliance statements in the box.
How the compliance with WEEE Directive works varies between the various EU states, but in the UK collection and recycling is done by local authorities who bill a central pool of money on a per unit basis. That pool of money is paid into by the producers of equipment on a per unit sold basis. in some other EU states it's done by the retailers.
Point is, it can be done, and has been done already - the system's not perfect, but at least it's a start on forcing manufacturers to consider what happens to their products at end of life. The EU's next target for this concept is car manufacturers.
Incidentally, we saw no price rises at consumer level when this directive was enacted, electrical equipment continued it's natural downwards price trend unchanged. We just got the same rip-off prices we always have had
Real happiness lies in the completion of work using your own brains and skills.
I'm stealing a page from Bill McDonough's wonderful book Cradle To Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things. Rather than selling us mere devices, manufacturers should be selling us services following the car leasing model: computer services, television viewing services, &c. That way, at the end of an item's amortised useful life (3-5 years), the consumer trades it back in for an updated model. Therefore, the manufacturer has an economic incentive to make recycling as easy as possible. Some people may say, 'But I want to own my widget!' My response: do you really want to own a depreciating asset? For rapidly-changing classes of asset, ownership makes little sense.
On a related note, Congress needs to ratify the Basel Convention like, erm, yesterday.
'He who has to break a thing to find out what it is, has left the path of wisdom.' -- Gandalf to Saruman
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