So, you’re looking at the casing of the spent battery you just removed from your cell phone and you realize you’re not exactly sure what “reproductive toxicity” is, and you’re not sure you even want to know. It sounds scary, and it’s just one of the side effects caused by the mountains of eWaste (you know, all those gizmos I wrote about six months ago) cluttering landfills.
What do you do with obsolete electronics? You know - the stuff that you couldn’t live without four months ago, but you don’t know what to do with today. Maybe you bought the “lowest common denominator” budget DVD player at your favorite big-box store, or maybe it’s an old cell phone that has seen better days and has now been replaced with an oh-so-tiny sleek flip model. Just pitch it into the trash, right? Wrong!
Technological progress is an amazing thing. As I write this, I glance down at my PDA, which contains more computing power than was available globally in the mid-60’s. So in just a few decades, we’ve upgraded and miniaturized, moving from clunky computers sized to fit a modest gymnasium to machines smaller than your hand. The way we did it is through the use of a variety of fairly exotic (and extremely toxic) chemicals and chemical compounds such as mercury, lead, cadmium, PVC, beryllium and chromium. We can’t help but accept and cherish these toxins in our electronics, because they allow wireless text messaging, digital photography, and push e-mail retrieval. But when they get out of the devices they are built into, they can also cause cancer, neurological and endocrine disorders, birth defects, and much, much more – so we don’t love these toxins in our air, water, food, or bodies. Hence, new legislation has arisen – like WEEE.
WEEE is the European Community directive 2002/96/EC on Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (hence the amusing name) which sets collection, recycling and recovery targets for all electrical goods.
WEEE is the European Community directive 2002/96/EC
WEEE and the Restriction of Hazardous Substances became European Law in February, 2003. Essentially, the new law places the responsibility for the e-waste problem on the companies who manufacture the Electrical and Electronic Equipment. Those companies must therefore establish an infrastructure for the collection of WEEE from households in such a way that consumers are able to return waste electrical equipment free of charge. Also, the manufacturing companies are required to use the collected waste in an environmentally-friendly manner, either by safe and responsible disposal or by reuse/refurbishment of the collected WEEE.
If you live outside of Europe, there are other systems to make sure that your electronics are properly disposed of when you’re done with them – you can either reuse or recycle your electrical equipment and batteries, rather than throwing them in the garbage. Otherwise, too many people around the world will find out what the phrase “may cause reproductive toxicity” really means.
