Mobile phone recycling
A solution to a growing problem
Most people have never recycled a mobile phone which has reached the end of its
lifespan. Despite the fact that this service is completely free (in some cases,
recyclers will even pay for mobiles), it seems many people still opt for the quick
solution of simply throwing their old mobile phones in the bin.
Data from the Environmental Protection Agency show that, in 2005 alone, discarded
electronic products, including mobile phones, amounted to from 1.9 to 2.2 million
tonnes. Of that, a staggering 80-90% ended up as waste in landfills, with only a
few thousand tonnes of discarded electronic products ever being recycled.
It is important, however, that mobile phones and other electronic products are recycled
at the end of their lifespans; due to the low costs of electronic products, which
have dropped sharply in recent years, mobile phone technology has become available
to everyone.
Indeed, 85% of adults in the UK are mobile phone users, while 4 out
of 5 children own a mobile phone before the time they are 11 years of age. Due to
some people owning multiple mobile phones, there actually more mobile phones in
use in the UK than there are people!. Obviously, this has had a great impact on the
volume of electronic waste being produced.
This is exacerbated by the rapid nature of technological development, which, coupled
with planned obsolescence, leads to mobile phones often being replaced within a
year or less of first being purchased. The effect of this is that electronic waste
is increasingly an environmental problem; 70% of heavy metals in American landfills
come from discarded electronic products.
The discardment as a waste product of old mobile phones could, in fact, prove an
even greater problem than these data suggest. In some jurisdictions, mobile phones
are classified as hazardous waste, due largely to toxic elements and compounds present
in mobile phone batteries. The possibility of these toxicants leeching from landfills
into water systems is a very real risk. The European Union has already put into
place environmental laws governing the recycling of mobile phones and other consumer
electronics in 2002’s Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Directive.
Given the clear problem presented by the sheer mass of waste generated by discarded
mobile phones, then, it is somewhat puzzling that mobile phone recycling, a simple,
elegant, and, above all, green, solution to this problem continues to be relatively
unpopular.
Thankfully, however, this appears to be changing; while 5 or so years
ago, most people would have been entirely unaware that mobile phone recycling existed
at all, today it is undergoing rapid growth.
Mobile phone recycling companies, which offer to pay people for mobile phones which
are broken, dead, or simply no longer in use, have sprung up in increasing numbers
in recent years, promoted by TV and radio advertising.
Many of these companies operate
primarily on the Web, such as cash4phones.com, thus saving large amounts of money
on infrastructure. This ensures efficiency; these savings are then passed on, essentially,
to the environment.
Everybody wins.