About $5.3 billion mobile phones And “smartphones” will be out of use this year, but despite being made of valuable Materialsonly a small part will be Recycling.
To give us an idea of the size of all these Hardware Stacked, with these 5.3 billion From the hardware, a 50,000 km tower can be built, 120 times after International Space StationThe way to the moon.
That is, although it contains gold, copper and silverPalladium and other recyclable components, its parts are surprisingly hardly recycle
You may be interested: Stoves are really “smart”, and now you can control them with an app
To find out why Role and the Business Do not recycle or repair electronic devices and Waste Electrical (WEEE), the WEEE Forum, the federation that brings together companies that manage their recycling, conducted a survey whose findings were endorsed by United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNTAR).
The poll results were released yesterday, hours before the poll date World e-waste daywhich is celebrated on October 14.
Surveys were conducted between June and September 2022 in 8 thousand 775 Role From the European Union (Portugal, the Netherlands, Italy, Romania and Slovenia) and the United Kingdom, where each household accumulates an average of 74 electronic products such as phones, tablets and laptopsAnd the electronic equipmenthair dryers, toasters and other appliances (excluding lamps).
Of those 74 products, 13 were preserved (nine working but unused, four malfunctioning).
In terms of quantity, the five most stocked WEEE products in Europe are small products electronic devices Consumption (headphones, remote controls), followed by household equipment (watches, irons), computer equipment (hard drives, routers, keyboards or mice), cell phones and smartphones, and kitchen appliances (toasters or grills).
On the other side of the scale are LEDs, which top the list of frequently discarded products. rubbish, destroy, destroy.
By countries, most of the compounds are Italy (29 percent), the Netherlands (17), the United Kingdom (14), Slovenia (12), Romania (9 percent), Portugal (8), and Lebanon (4).
As for reasons, Europeans accumulate WEEE because they believe it can be used again in the future (46 percent), for sale or given away (15), because of its sentimental value (13), because it can have value in the future (9) Because they don’t know how recycle (7), due to lack of time or because you plan to use it in a second home (3) or because it contains sensitive data (2 percent).
Pascal Leroy, CEO of the WEEE Forum (the organization that promoted World e-waste day) that “People do not realize that these seemingly insignificant elements are of great value, and together they are globally colossal.”
In 2022 alone, WEEE’s little items were like phonesElectric toothbrushes, toasters and cameras produced around the world would weigh an estimated 24.5 million tonsfour times the weight of the Great Pyramid of Giza, according to WEEE Forum data.
The worst thing is that these Hardware They contain important resources that can be reused in the new electronic deviceswind turbines, electric car batteries or Solar Panelsand that they are “critical for the environmental and digital transition towards low carbon societies,” the WEEE Forum highlights.
➡️ Subscribe to our newsletter and receive the most relevant feedback in your email
Over the past 20 years, WEEE Forum companies have been collecting and decontaminating Recycling or prepared to reuse more than 30 million tons of WEEE.
On Rudiger Kouer, Head of the Bonn Unitar Bureau, “International Day of e-waste It reminds us of the avalanche of problems we face if we don’t take the right steps, without which global e-waste could double to 100 million ton or more in the next 30 years.
Read also other contents of Normal ⬇️
“Creator. Devoted pop culture specialist. Certified web fanatic. Unapologetic coffee lover.”