E-waste trade is the unacceptable face of recycling

Computer manufacturers must take responsibility for dealing with electronic waste to ensure toxic trash doesn't fall into the wrong hands

Fred Pearce, guardian.co.uk 28 May 09;

Dell, the world's second largest PC manufacturer, announced earlier this month that it is imposing a ban on the export of used equipment bearing its name to developing countries – unless the equipment is in full working order and intended for legitimate use.

The idea is to undermine the huge trade in e-waste, too much of which ends up in giant trash piles in Africa, India and China, from where it is dismantled, burned, treated with corrosive chemicals and otherwise persuaded to give up tiny amounts of chemicals that can be sold on. The big question is why all the other manufacturers don't have a similar policy.

I've seen these toxic waste operations in action. They call it recycling, but it's extremely damaging. In an industrial wasteland outside New Delhi in India, I watched as children as young as eight dunked bare circuit boards in acid to create a residue of copper for sale to a local works. Child labour? You bet. Health and safety? You have to be joking.

A family of migrant boys from Bihar, India's poorest state, told me they got used to the acrid fumes that had them coughing and giddy within minutes of coming on the job. "At the end of the day we have a strong drink and we are OK," one laughed. It's an evil trade. But how do you stop it?

Dell admits that it cannot wave a magic wand and ban its used products from export. But it has a worldwide policy of accepting back without charge all used Dell equipment. It requires all its contractors to accept the used equipment, to follow the new rules – and to act as whistleblowers on rivals who do not.

"This is a very significant announcement," Barbara Kyle of the Electronics Takeback Coalition in the US told Associated Press earlier this month.

The e-waste trade is the unacceptable face of recycling. Greenpeace reckons that as much as 80% of the electronic waste sent for recycling in the US ends up being "recycled" using dangerous low-tech methods in foreign countries. And, despite Europe's tougher laws, a lot gets through the net there, too.

Just a few months ago, Computer Aid International, a charity that gives old computers a new life in schools and other places in developing countries, criticised Britain's Environment Agency for failing to conduct an investigation after British e-waste turned up in the hands of child dismantlers in west Africa.

"What are the other manufacturers doing to ensure a responsible outcome for the equipment?" asked Tony Roberts, of Computer Aid International. "All manufacturers should be held accountable for the disposal of any product manufacturer by them."

Many other companies offer take-back services. But that is very different from imposing rules on their supply chains. And on closer examination, the take-back services often seem half-hearted at best.

The printer maker Lexmark is currently covering Britain with posters advertising its environmental credentials and encouraging users of its printers to print less. Good for them. But what about the e-waste?

In the US, if you want to safely recycle an old Lexmark printer, you have to pay the bill for shipping your printer back to its offices in Tennessee.

A study by Greenpeace this month of the environmental record of electronics companies did not give Dell a great record because it had been slow to eliminate some toxic ingredients from its products. But at least it is now taking a strong stand about making sure those toxins don't get into the wrong hands and it should rise up the Greenpeace chart.

Its rivals will have to do a lot better to keep up. Greenpeace singled out the largest computer manufacturer Hewlett Packard on its handling of e-waste. HP claims to have been "an industry leader in reducing its impact on the environment ... for 50 years", but Greenpeace didn't agree. It criticised HPs weak scheme for voluntary take-back of its equipment amongst other things.

Also criticised for failing to handle e-waste were Acer and Lenovo, whose "commitment to social responsibility" does not highlight e-waste.

These companies need to quit the greenwash and get real about ending this bogus recycling business.