What Is E-Waste? E-Waste Explained By A Sustainability Expert

If you’re like most people, you use electronics for at least a few hours each day. While these devices make our lives easier and more enjoyable, they are all eventually going to be replaced. At that point, they will likely be sent to a landfill, where they will contribute to a host of environmental and social issues.

This waste is known as e-waste and in this article, we will discuss more about what e-waste is, sources of e-waste, which countries produce the most, and more.

What Is E-Waste?

E-waste, also known as electronic waste, is the waste stream produce from discarded electronic devices. Some examples include refrigerators, electric tea kettles, electric toothbrushes, light bulbs, smartphones, and laptops.

These devices are often discarded because they break, stop working, get replaced by newer devices, or get lost or stolen.

Why Is E-Waste A Problem?

E-waste contains more than 1000 different substances, many of which are toxic. When e-waste is disposed, these substances can enter nearby waterways and soil through landfill leaching, airways through incineration, and the human body through direct contact during the recycle process.

E-waste is also a waste of important and difficult to obtain materials.

Some of the different substances within e-waste are metals, such as copper used for wire, aluminum for tubing in refrigerators, iron for motors, lithium in batteries, and many others such Zinc, Nickel, and Cobalt. Even gold can be found on circuit boards and silver can be found in switches.

Leaching

When it rains, water can wash toxic metals and substances into the waterways and soil of surrounding communities [1]. Studies show the leachate from e-waste contains significantly higher amounts of metals than leachate from other waste streams [2]. Not only this, but these metals have been shown to be toxic to plants, soil, aquatic life, and ground water. It is confirmed that leachate acts as a genotoxic to a mammalian cell [3].

As you can see below, top soil and sub soil from e-waste disposal sites contain higher concentrations of several metals when compared to other disposal sites that don’t accept e-waste.

Social and Equity

Even recycling may not be the best option in all cases to handle e-waste. This is because recycling must be done properly. In many countries around the world, they don’t have the proper tools or training to recycle e-waste. This means they resort to methods like burning or using chemicals to try and get the recyclable materials out of the electronic waste, which puts e-waste workers directly at risk [1].

There is evidence that people who live in an e-waste recycling community have higher DNA damage than communities without it [4].

So, no matter the disposal path, if e-waste is not handled properly, it can negatively impact the local environment, including the surrounding, people, air, water, and soil.

E-Waste Pollutants May Be In Your Food

There is evidence that suggests that e-waste pollutants may make their way into agricultural and other products that are exported around the world [5].

So even though you may not live near an e-waste disposal site, you could be consuming products that come from areas near e-waste disposal sites that have been impacted by e-waste pollution.

In addition, all of this wasted material was extracted, transported, processed, manufactured and shipped all of the world, which means greenhouse gases were generated which contribute to climate change.

The Economic Cost Of E-Waste

It’s estimated that we throw away $62.5 billion annually [1] of metals within e-waste, which is more than the gross domestic product (GDP) of most countries, a measure of all the goods and services produced by a country.

In fact, its estimated 1,808,000 tons of copper is thrown away each year. This is enough copper for nearly 23 million electric cars each year. For reference, Tesla sold about 1 million electric cars in 2021 [6] and worldwide there were about 6.5 million electric cars sold in 2021 [7]. So there is more than enough copper in our e-waste to meet our copper needs in creating electric vehicles for many years. In a world where there is growing concern we won’t be able to find enough metals to meet our needs, e-waste could be a promising source.

And while the human, environmental, and economic impact of these lost metals is high, very little is actually recovered and recycled each year.

E-WASTE IS THE FASTEST GROWING SOURCE OF WASTE IN THE WORLD

The worlds fastest growing waste stream is e-waste [8]. In 2019, the world generated over 53 million tons of e-waste [9]. To put this into perspective, the titanic weighed only 52,000 tons. This means the world generates over 1000 times the weight of the titanic in e-waste each year. This is about 1.6 tons or over 3000 pounds of e-waste each second.

Of the 53 million tons generated each year, only about 17% gets recycled, while the other 83% ends up in landfills, incinerators, and elsewhere [9].

What are The Sources of E-waste?

According to certain studies, the vast majority of e-waste is generated from households instead of businesses and comes from disposing large appliances [10]. In almost every country analyzed, over 90% of e-waste was generated in households. So we everyday people, and not businesses or other commercial locations, are generating this waste.

According to other studies [8], at least half or more of the e-waste generated in the homes of most countries is the result of throwing away small and large appliances.

Small appliances are electronics such as vacuums, microwaves, toasters, and cameras, while large appliances are things like washing machines, clothes dryers, dishwashing machines, and electric stoves, which tend to weigh more than small appliances.

Large appliance make up a large portion of e-waste because they are so heavy. Think about how many toasters you’d have to throw away to equal the weight of one dishwasher.

The remaining e-waste falls into 4 main categories:

Cooling and freezing equipment: refrigerators and air conditioners
Screens and monitors: televisions, monitors, laptops, and tablets
Lamps
Small IT and Telecommunication equipment: mobile phones, GPS devices, personal computers, printers, and telephones [12].

Solar panels are usually included in their own category and don’t make up a significant waste stream just yet, likely because their use has only increased in more recent years, and they can last for several decades

How To Solve The E-Waste Issue

E-waste laws are likely not the answer to the e-waste problem, unless they are made stricter. A much more effective and quicker solution is for consumers to purchase and dispose of their waste more responsibly.

Right now, over 70% of the worlds population already has some policy on e-waste, which means current policies are not effective enough [12]. In Europe, only two countries have met the legally binding e-waste recycling goals [13]. In the US, only about 10% of e-waste is recycled [14].

Since most e-waste is produced by homes, this gives us the power to take action against e-waste ourselves.

Reduce

The first step in reducing any type of waste is reduction. This is means that e-waste is never generated, or at least generated in smaller quantities.

To reduce e-waste generation, only purchase items that you need. For example, if you wait until your smartphone stops working before getting a new one. You can also purchase products that are built to last longer so that you don’t need to replace it frequently [15].

Reuse

When you must get a new electronic device, try to find one that has already been used. You can find used electronics on many different sites, such as e-Bay, Back Market, Amazon, and many other sites. You can also find them in local thrift stores, community groups, or from neighbors, friends, and family.

Repair

Many electronics stop working due to single parts that can be repaired by using new parts. This type of repair work has a significantly lower impact than buying a entire new device. It may be expensive, but if sustainability is your goal, repairing is great option.

Recycle

Last, whatever can not be reduced, reused, or repaired, should be recycled. Recycling should be the last strategy used as of handling e-waste, but it’s often the only strategy used, if any strategy is used at all.

E-waste recycling involves a bit more effort because you usually can’t have it picked ur from your home and either need to take it somewhere or send it somewhere. There are many online resources to help you figure out where your device can be sent for recycling or some other use.