Lead in your Cellphone?

Electronic waste is one of the fastest growing environmental issues not only in the United States, but all around the world. Electronics are at the center of today’s day to day operations. We all use them at home, school and work but never do we consider the environmental and health hazards associated with the improper disposal of these gadgets. In August of 2010, climate change was replaced by electronic waste as one of the top areas of global environmental concern by EPA’s Administrator Lisa Jackson after the meeting of the Commission for Environmental Cooperation in Guanajuato, Mexico.

The Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition (SVTC) reports similar statistics to the EPA except that in addition, SVTC reports that around 90% of e-waste ends up directly in landfills. The remaining 10% gets wrongly mixed with other recyclables. Of the 10% recycled, only 20% goes through proper electronic recycling.  A warping 80% gets shipped off (mostly illegally) to developing continents like Africa, Asia and India. With tighter environmental regulations, the cost for properly recycling one ton of electronic waste in the United States and Europe is about 1400 dollars. When companies ship the waste to third world continents like Africa, Asia, India, they only have to pay about forty dollars per ton of electronic waste. Recyclers in these developing continents use dangerous means to extract minimal amounts of valuable materials like silver, gold, palladium while exposing themselves to heavy toxic metals like lead, mercury, arsenic, cadmium etc. In Asia, Africa and India, circuit boards are processed with open flames or acid baths, monitors and TVs filled with lead are smashed open with basic tools, plastics are melted with toxic flame retardants. All of this is generally done by impoverished workers, often including children. The final resting place for most of the left over e-waste components is in landfills. Electronic waste contains heavy metals like mercury, cadmium, lead, etc. which cause various health hazards when introduced into the human body.  At the landfills, some of the toxins are introduced into the air and some rainfall transfers some into drinking water and soil. In the United States there are limits against heavy metal exposure. Because third world countries do not have them, it doesn’t give us the right to put their lives in danger. The United States is one out of only three countries out of all the countries in the world that refuse to sign the treaty banning the shipment of hazardous waste like e-waste to less fortunate nations.

http://www.americanbar.org/newsletter/publications/gp_solo_magazine_home/gp_solo_magazine_index/solo_lawyer_waste_dispose_pollution_environment_electronics.html