E waste

Intro
Billions of people are using a lot of electronic devices therefore it is natural that a lot of e waste
arises,

Americans throw away an estimated of 55 billion in e-waste material annually

The World health organisation is warning that the amount of E-waste around the world is growing
significantly

But what is e-waste and why are there many health

risks associated with it?
electronic waste referred to as e waste includes all discarded electric or electronic device, the
danger produced from e waste may come from direct contact with the harmful materials and heavy
metal such as lead cadmium and chromium from the inhalation of fumes and from the leaching of
toxic materials and their accumulation in water soil and food

According to the institute of physics, the huge amount of lead in e waste if released into the
environment could cause severe damage to human blood and kidneys as well as to the central and
peripheral nervous systems

Even some current recycling activities can pose a risk of injury. To date there has been some
recycling of the valuable elements contained in e-waste such as copper and gold. However these are
extracted using fairy primitive methods such as burning cables to remove the plastic and extract the
copper. These methods expose workers who are children to toxic fumes

According to WHO several organisations have highlighted the need for interventions in the field of e-
waste

A lot of children target children as they are the most vulnerable to harm from exposure to e waste.

As children are still growing harmful substances can affect their development to a great extent

So what can you do to help combat e-waste?

You can sell or donate old electronics,

You can maintain electronics properly so the last longer,

You can recycle and dispose of e-waste.

Before buying a new electronic device consider repurposing the old one,
You can store data online to clear storage space and help your electronic last longer

You can buy Energy star rated electronics.

There is good reason to follow these few simple rules

By recycling 100000 e waste, you can recycle

-35000 pounds of copper

-33 pounds of palladium

-772 pounds of silver

-75 pounds of gold

Can be recovered….

That material is not only worth money but recover \y recovery will also help reduce the amount of
mining necessary

But why is it so hard to follow this rule?

Because nowadays electronics are made to be replaced, It’s called “planned obsolescence”.

Take for example Apples operating system made use of haptic feature that are required an IPhone
6s and so forth these kind of features are very common in today's electronics and so t you are force
to replace them. And one has to wonder what happens to the old appliance?

Can they be fully recycled now that parts of them are no longer needed?

This situation is further worsened by the economics of gadgets. Very often it is cheaper to buy
something new then to fix something old and so we find ourselves with two unfortunate situations.

The first is the danger increasing mining for procurement for the materials needed for production of
gadgets

And the second is large amount of electronics in land fields leaking toxicity.

What is sad that this ewaste could easily reduce by “reuse repair and resale “

according to the report of ENDS Europe agency built-in obsolescence has seen the share of large
household appliances that had to be replace it in the first five years grow from 7% in 2004 to 13% in
2013.

And companies also to blame as increasingly end support for older models or the operating system
that run on them. The eWaste is caused by the whole idea of pushing consumer to buy products
quickly by making older obsolete and it is causing Havoc on our planet.

It’s complicated issue that requires a complex solution

One such solution would be to required electronics sellers to provide buy-backs or return system for
used equipment’s

Export limits could also be introduce where the quantity exported has to equal to that recycled or
reduced

There are plenty solutions that can be conceived if we just put our hearts into it and for the sake of
environment we should…