E-waste is also referred to as waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) and is solid waste that has become a very complex problem in terms of collection, storage, recycling and disposal. Handling e-waste is an international issue experienced by developed and developing countries alike. Consider the ubiquitous cell phone, which has valuable material inside such as plastics, gold, silver and platinum but it also contains toxic materials like lead, mercury and cadmium. For both reasons, it seems a waste and a hazard to just throw cell phones away in a landfill.
You may want to visit the EPA site on eCycling (Links to an external site.) as you begin answering the following questions in your Main Discussion Board Post.
Do you think that manufacturers of computers, television sets, cell phones, batteries and other forms of electronic devices should be required to take them back when they become e-waste at the ends of their useful lives for repair, remanufacture and reuse, or recycling in a manner that is environmentally responsible and that does not threaten the health of recycling workers or scavengers? Explain your answer by providing at least three arguments for or against.
Would you be willing to pay more for these products to cover the costs of such a take-back program? If yes, then what percent cost above the purchase price would you be willing to pay for electronic products? Justify your answer.
Find an example of one of the following and provide a narrative description that includes details relating to e-waste, collection, storage, recycling and/or disposal:
A Company that has an e-waste policy,
An incident involving the improper handling or disposal of e-waste,
Any country law or treaty that addresses e-waste.
Provide proper references for any material you use from primary sources.
Respond to and discuss at least one other student’s Main Post.
Please respond to the below in 3 to 4 sentences:
I don’t believe that manufacturers of electronic devices should be required to take back their products when they become e-waste. Those kinds of actions require legislation, and every time the government gets involved, we the citizen pay the price. Companies collect e-waste and recycle them and, by doing so, saving in the cost of mining for those products. When I mention that the citizen is the one who pays for force compliance, is that the cost gets passed down to the consumer. However, that doesn’t stop the states from passing legislation to recycle e-waste. California passed an e-recycling law in 2003, and after that, 27 other states passed a similar law. Guess who pays for the fees associated with the collection, the citizens pay, 23 other states require manufacturers to cover the cost involved in the collection of their products to some degree.
I don’t like the idea of paying more for everything, never the less, for e-waste products. What is needed for the states to do is to put e-waste location at strategic points across cities, where citizens could go and recycle their e-waste. A lot of people dump some of their e-waste with the trash, which ends up at the landfill. For example, Best Buy has a collection of e-waste for customers. However, it is still limited to some items like batteries and power supply, significant things like TV, printers, computer, and other large items they don’t have a collection in place—internal policies various. Another example is FSCJ; The college has its policies to handle all kinds of waste, including e-waste. In the loading dock, the college has a container to collect items like printer toner, metal, and others. For electronics like computer, printer, speaker and other, they get collected by the IT department and send to the warehouse. I know this process because my father works in the IT department in downtown FSCJ.