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Can't figure out what to do with that old television, air conditioner, computer monitor or toaster oven? The Wynnewood Whole Foods will take your trash for free, at next Saturday's electronic recycling event, to be held Sept. 8 from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m ... Recycle Electronics At Whole Foods, Sept. 8
The IT production industry has a Large Carbon footprint, which can be reduced through the re-use and re-deployment of redundant IT equipment namely Computer Recycling.
We're all aware of the impact our use of scarce resources is having on the environment. Two years ago saw a sudden and prolonged increase in the price of steel, copper and gold. These were brought about mainly by the rapid and somewhat unexpected growth in the Chinese economy. Why should this have any effect upon the recycling of computers you might ask? Depletion of non re-newable resources leaves only two options, find a new material (very expensive) or find a way to recycle and extract the old. With the Price of gold hitting $ 400 per troy ounce, it suddenly became extremely viable for recyclers, such as our selves to market our services. There's been a very big boom in computer recycling over the past year.
Most of the environmental concerns with computers lie with the monitor, speci fically its cathode ray tube (CRT). Each color monitor contains, on average, four to five pounds of lead, considered hazardous waste when disposed of. Computers also contain other hazardous materials, including mercury, cadmium (a known carcinogen), and hexavalent chromium (shown to cause high blood pressure, iron-poor blood, liver disease, and nerve and brain damage in animals). Over 314 million computers were thrown away at the end of 2007, containing 1.2 billion pounds of lead, 2 million pounds of cadmium, 1.2 million pounds of hexavalent chromium, and 400,000 pounds of mercury.
Part of the problem computer recycling has is, after upgrading computer systems, most organizations store their old computers, which serve as backup equipment in case newer computers break down. These old computers often sit in storage well beyond their potential useful life. At some point, a decision must be made about disposal of this equipment. Continuing to store it is often not a viable option, it eventually takes up a considerable amount of space. The least desirable option is to throw old computers into the bin. Computer recycling comes to the fore in every scenario possible, not just the effect it has upon the environment, there is also the possibility of someone removing hard drives and recovering sensitive data.
A number of factors have led to an upsurge of interest in people wanting to recycle old computer kit, including growing awareness around environmental issues, as well as the recent introduction in the UK of the Waste Electronic and Electrical Equipment (WEEE) directive. (1 - June - 2006)
At the time of first writing this article the BBC News website had an excellent article about identity theft and the disposal / recycling of old computers and I quote from that article "Bank account details belonging to thousands of Britons are being sold in West Africa for less than £20 each, the BBC's Real Story program has found.
It disco vered that fraudsters in Nigeria were able to find internet banking data stored on recycled PCs sent from the UK to Africa."
This drives home the point that you should destroy the data on your hard disk - before getting rid of the computer or hard disk in it. Computer recycling, isn't always about the environment, but of company and national safety importance too.
From an environmental point of view it is far better to recycle your computer at an official recycling center than to dispose of it. It may even be illegal in some countries to dispose of electrical equipment by any other method other than by taking it to an approved computer recycling center or sending it back to the original manufacturer.
Related Computer Recycling For Environmental Issues TopicsQuestion by erik.ramirez83: Best way to recycle computer parts for profit? I have about 20 old computers that I want to take apart to recycle. What is the best way of seperating the parts and wire separately? Should I chop the wires of the power supply or recycle as a whole? Or open the power supply and take parts from within? Should I take apart the CPU processor for the gold? Can I mix the IDE, SATA and power supply cables? Or seperate them? Mix cd/DVD drives with floppy drives? USB controller, should I chop the cables from it or recycle as a whole? Thanks in advance Best answer for Best way to recycle computer parts for profit?:
Answer by Alex Volfson
Environmentally, you'll probably do the best by finding people, companies or organizations that are in need of a simple computer. Otherwise, I'd say you better find a buyer for all the parts you'll end up with before you even pick-up a pair of scissors. I don't know of *any*.
Answer by J.
First- find a scrap buyer, Second, find out how they want the items. Usually they will sort: CPUs by ceramic, plastic or tin tops. Memory sticks by gold contact or tinned contact. Hard drives separate from the other drives. CD.DVD and floppy drives can usually go together. PCI cards devoid of the metal end plate where feasible. Removable chips get sorted with CPUs with same criteria as above. Remove batteries. Wire is wire- remove the ferites. Connectors have potential if they have gold contacts. Otherwise plated ends can go with wire. Motherboards should have all caps removed- (those can be sold as scrap aluminum.) remove batteries, plastic pieces, and iron/steel attachments where feasible. Most likely you will throw away the plastic. It is not likely you can find a buyer for it these days. The ferrous scraps will not likely amount to enough to get any money- if they take it offf your hands for free- go for it. As for things like the USB ports- remove them from the plates, chop the wires and those with just the connectors go to connectors, those with a board attached go to "B" boards. Gold memory sticks and motherboards go to "A" Dismantle the mice, the keyboards, and other atchments in the same way. The small board is "B" Remove the plastic. Power supplies, chop the wires and stack them separate. Monitors are a different story. Most places you will have to pay for disposal, and no option to remove the internals. If you can dispose of just the CRT's through someone, you break down the monitors the same way as the other stuff- the boards are "B" graded. The yokes need to be broke down to the ferrite and the copper- remove the plastic as well for best price. Otherwise they sell as motor scrap. Depending on the buyer, you might be able to mix the ribbon cables with the regular scrap wire. With just 20 units, don't expect a lot of money for your time and tool investment.. In my area, this how they buy them for best return on effort.
Answer by Jim
"J." 's pretty much got it down. but second & emphasize where "J." says: "Find a buyer" & find out how they want it, some are quite different.
