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Electronics Are 'the Fastest-Growing Waste Stream in the World' (vice.com)
Electronic waste is a growing threat to the environment. Thanks to the low cost of manufacturing, it's easier than ever for corporations to pump out millions of laptops, smart phones, internet of things devices, and other electronics. From a report: A new initiative combining the efforts of the United Nations and the World Economic Forum and the World Business Council for Sustainable Development wants to change that. The group formed the Platform for Accelerating the Circular Economy (PACE), and announced itself at Davos -- a yearly gathering of the world's wealthy elite -- where it released its first report. "E-waste is now the fastest-growing waste stream in the world," PACE's report said. "It is estimated this waste stream reached 48.5 million tonnes in 2018." Most of that waste comes from Europe and the United States and ends up in places like Nigeria and Hong Kong, which suffer the human and economic costs of disposing of the material. "The material value [of e-waste] alone is worth $62.5 billion, three times more than the annual output of the world's silver mines and more than the GDP of most countries," PACE's report [PDF] said.
Lets all show how much we care about the environment!
Make standards, enforce them, include a recycling fee deposit in the price, etc. THERE ARE SOLUTIONS, expecting it to solve itself is lazy Libertarian fantasy faggot shit.
You would think that some smart person would come up with a way to recycle this junk and reclaim the valuable minerals.
I guess it's cheaper to exploit miners in third world countries to mine new minerals rather than exploit recyclers in third world countries to reclaim the minerals.
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
In some countries you pay a recycling fee up front, when you buy it.
Those would be the countries that have intelligent governments.
Not like here in the US where we have brain trusts like Twitler and his minions. And all the nitwits that follow him blindly.
Go ahead, mod me down, see if I care. You know it's true.
"Fastest-growing" is one of the worst kinds of rhetorical tricks. I haven't researched this area yet, but obviously one should compare actual numbers with other classes of waste before drawing conclusions.
Windows XP being end of life’d despite being offered on netbooks new less than five years before the deadline. Now with Windows 7 being chopped we will have even more junk. Pefectly good 32 bit hardware is being scrapped due to progammers too lazy to optimize ram usage. The situation is worse with MacOS and android with the lack of updates being offered to most devices. Meanhile my “dumb” phone still is functional 10 years later.
So many products are essentially disposable because of the built-in non-user removable batteries. How about we outlaw that?
If I could have bought a genuine battery for my LG Nexus 5 instead of buying another phone, I would have. The only thing wrong with my defunct 2010 MacBook Pro is the battery. Headphones, another great example. How do you replace the batteries in Apple's AirPods? I still own lots of my old game consoles, and play them occasionally, going back to the Sega Mega Drive (Genisis for you US folk). I was gifted a Nintendo Switch, but I doubt that will work in 20+ years like the Mega Drive.
If we can stop this cancer, and even standardise the batteries, it will solve a lot of e-waste.
Tossing your trash out of your immediate line of sight still dirties up the same rock we all live on.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
I hope Trump brings a blanket for his cell when he goes off to Federal prison, not only will it keep his faggot traitor ass warm for the prisoners to fuck, it will muffle the sound of his asshole being opened up to minivan size.
"Men" don't spend their days making gayass jokes like ^^, you're somewhere short of that denomination.
Clearly you haven't seen the trickle coming out of an old man's desiccated penis.
Well too bad, I have FB blocked at the 20-odd IP level. I will not be seeing what Takei has to say about this unless you cut and paste it here. Fuck Facebook, it's an illegitimate thing to link to in 2019.
Apple accepts any old Apple product, and extracts as much as they can from it. In the last large keynote they did the stated goal was no more mining of materials because they could get what they needed from recycling old devices.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
100% tax on devices with glued-in batteries that can't be changed by the user in under 10 minutes. Same with soldered-in non-upgradeable storage. Donesky!
Isn't that an obvious conclusion when product companies actively block products from being repaired? And going as far as classifying something as trivial as a battery replacement AS a repair?
Granted with some devices that are small (Like Bluetooth hands-free sets) making them large enough for a battery replacement is difficult, but with no headphone jack, we're still back to the producing company to point the primary finger at for why this is happening.
I know its far fetched but what if companies (by rules I guess ? give ideas) maybe if they could use some kind of regular standard on design that way companies could reuse the same equipment or hardware. Less garbage in the end. Its not a perfect solution and I'm sure its going to be a NO from Apple for example since one of their biggest marketing strategy is to be different visually when making phones and laptops...#fuck apple anyways.
Leave Taco Bell out of this.
Yeah! Fuck Facefook!
... is two years old! How will I fit in with such an old "device"?
CUR ALLOC 20195.....5804M
Everything that is sold needs to be evaluated for to cost of recycling it and then add that cost to the item as a tax. That way, when a recycler spends $X to recycle thrown out object Y then they get that recycling investment money.
This isn't a complex problem, we just have weak/corrupt politicians stopping us from doing what has to be done.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
You have a choice: increase access to the poor and protect the environment. There is no viable market model for a = $100 phone that makes it not a pile of crap that will be unsupported 2 months before it hits the market. If there were, Apple probably would have found it and monetized it.
People need to get used to the fact that the market forces that open up all of these electronics to people who cannot afford to spend $700 for a phone, $2k for a laptop and such guarantee that it will be a pile of garbage that is designed to be replaced more of than it should be from an environmental perspective. You simply cannot make a super high quality device at that price point using anything resembling current specs.
" I guess you think all Republicans don't give a shit." - Yeah, because that's the reality, you sniveling bootlicking lying coward backing a fucking traitor. You are literally the problem to solve. Your ignorance knows no bounds.
You've eroded any semblance of standards or veritas in your entire party with your constant backpeddling and excuses for bullshit baldfaced lies. You should hang, to be perfectly honest. You are a traitor.
So yeah, when you pretend it's a Republican priority to get rid of plastic waste, and someone calls you a lying faggot? They're right about you, lying faggot. Deal with it snowflake - or stop lying, one of the two, bitch.
I initially misread the title as Electronic Arts the fastest growing waste...
Got a little laugh out of that.
A real solution: Standards and Modularity. Modularize and standardize batteries, power supplies, cables, chargers, interfaces, screens, cases, individual components/sub-components and assemblies so they can be reused and used in multiple types of devices. Even screws. Now everything is so proprietary that things can't be reused or used in different systems, so everything becomes waste.
- Non-removable batteries : Illegal
- Glued RAM/SSD/CPU/... : Illegal
- Anything unrepairable : Illegal !!
Will $CURRENT_YEAR be the year of the Linux Desktop?
With Electric batteries having a limited life span (like all of my old smart phones), we should include electric cars, which are basically smart phones on wheels. lol.
Why is this even a thing? So what? China, Hong Kong, etc. gathers the materials, manufactures it, and sells it in the US. We in the US buy it, use it, and when we're done with it, we send it back. If it's such a problem, they should figure out how to deal with it, since it's all going back from whence it came anyway.
There should be significant tax penalties for:
- Non replaceable batteries OR OEM refuses to make available replacement batteries
- Devices that can't be reasonably easily opened (e.g. require hot air gun to pry away glued-down screen to get into case)
- Vendor applies warranty void stickers or attempts to void warranty for effecting a repair via replacement of a battery or modular part
And smaller penalties for:
- Devices that are not modular (e.g. things like cameras, speakers, etc. soldered to mainboard)
- Vendor commits to OS security updates and/or critical fixes for less than 3 years
..in absolute numbers how environmental footprint of all of electronics industry compares to the footprint of a single full size container cargo or tanker ship.
When it's cheaper to throw away something instead of repairing it you get a lot of electronics being thrown away.
When you are unable to fix or upgrade your electronics BY DESIGN you get a lot of electronics being thrown away.
When you get a mentality that you need to get the latest, greatest "thing" every six or twelve months as a fashion statement you get a lot of electronics being thrown away.
Just dig a big hole in the ground and dump everything there. Charge for disposal. It's what we do with every other waste product and seems to be working out ok. When it's full, build a golf course. Dig another hole next door. If the costs exceed proper disposal, you might see some engineering solutions come forward.
" I guess you think all Republicans don't give a shit." - Yeah, because that's the reality, you sniveling bootlicking lying coward backing a fucking traitor. You are literally the problem to solve. Your ignorance knows no bounds.
You've eroded any semblance of standards or veritas in your entire party with your constant backpeddling and excuses for bullshit baldfaced lies. You should hang, to be perfectly honest. You are a traitor.
So yeah, when you pretend it's a Republican priority to get rid of plastic waste, and someone calls you a lying faggot? They're right about you, lying faggot. Deal with it snowflake - or stop lying, one of the two, bitch.
It should be illegal to manufacture, or import for resale and electronic product into which batteries have been glued.
If they can't be easily removed and replaced by the end user, then the product shouldn't be allowed into (well, Canada for me), but any "first world" nation.
A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
Best Buy will take your obsolete electronics for recycling at all US stores. There is usually a bin at the front door for small items, but larger items can be dropped off at the customer service desk.
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
Maybe if the environmentalists didn't mandate that electronics have lead free solder, and instead mandate compulsory recycling with major fines we would have electronics that didn't end up in the trash after a year or two.
Lead free solder is right up there with bad capacitors as one of the primary reasons consumer electronics fail. There is a reason the aerospace industry does not accept electronics with lead free solder.
I'm trying to do my part...
https://www.practicalmachinist...
My 2 step solution: If you're no longer providing reasonably priced support, you must release all tech info so others can. And, if you manufacture it, anyone can dump your product back on your doorstep for you to deal with...
When the king heard the words of the Book of the Law he tore his robes.2Kings22:11
Make an international electronics waste dump, in the South China Sea, or Antarctica. It will cost money to recycle the stuff, and the stuff is willing to sit around, doing nothing. In 50 or a 100 years, someone might invent some cheap electronic waste processing plant, to handle the enormous amount of waste which has accumulated by then.
One problem I see is that in my town we have an electronic "recycling" bin at the landfill which really just goes to a scrapper. People put their old electronics in there thinking that they're doing such good for the world.
Unfortunately there's quite a few good items put in there like flat panel TV's that just need a minor repair. I've seen i5 class computers, perfectly good JBL speakers, and lots of laptop power supplied, among a lot of other stuff. Unfortunately, the town makes a few cents per pound, so we're prohibited from actually doing the environment good and reusing the items.
Of course, no one wants ink-jet printers, or glass tube televisions, especially the 39" Sony. The glass on those is about an inch thick, but there's a lot of usable items going to scrap.
Only buy things with repairable options (batteries, LCD, connectors, mic, speaker, etc..) Also upgradeable module options. CPU, Storage, I/O. Give me a phone with a CPU module, Phone module, LCD backplane, Battery options chemistry options. Just a thought.
as a cause of cancer and at the expense of the cigarette companies, companies that make electronics that are not repairable, or that have non-replaceable batteries, or that have designed-in obsolesence should be publicly labelled as "Gross Polluters" (the same label california slaps on some cars).
This alone would be a rebuke to the snotty obnoxious fake "green" people at places like Apple who not only use the slave labor of a dictatorship, and use raw materials that dictatorship gets by strip mining, but then makes those products non-repairable purely to force them into the trash so the customer base will buy the new model. Modern semiconductors are good for at least 30 years (well, except for flash memory which will die much sooner if hammered with write cycles), but I doubt anydod will have the came cell phone after 20 of those 30 years. Apple and Samsung will see to it that users are drooling over the next model within 2 or 3 years of buying a phone.
Virgin Media (UK) should be ashamed.
I have cable internet, TV and phone from them and the service is pretty good.
Note that the equiptment (cable modem + seperate Cable TV box) belongs to them, I'm just renting it.
Recently they required me to have new versions of the Modem and TV box (I didn't request it, it wasn't optional). When they've done this in the past they've provided a return label for the old equipment, you package it up and return it (collection points everywhere in shops etc.). This time - they refer you to some random company on the internet, they don't seem to have any arrangement with them and it's all up to you. This is *their equipment*. It's disgraceful.
This is a tempest in a teapot. Manufacturers know that survivability requires limited lifetime products. There are only 7 billion people on this planet which means it is very easy to limit your profitability if you can not generate repeat sales.
This would not normally be a problem. It is the nature of the beast. Where the problem comes in is greed. Sure, that iphone could last for 10 years easily... but, we want MORE money than default attrition would give... so the attrition rate is increased to where your phone will generally only last about two years rather than 10.
All because of greed, not because of entropy.
Since we are not going to ever deal with greed in a rational manner, we may as well just get used to having electronic waste build in a geometric fashion.
Enjoy the ride.
"Someone needs to talk to the tree of liberty about its ghoulish drinking problem." by ohnocitizen