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How many computers do you own that have become road-kill on the information superhighway? Are they stacked in closets, hidden away in the basement, or sitting on garage shelves – stored away because tossing them seems too wasteful? Well, you’re not alone; according to the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, a whopping 75% of computers taken out of service each year are gathering dust. But don’t despair – an option will soon exist to deal with those old Commodores, Data Generals and
Tandys.
On November 18, Eco-Cycle will be kicking off the state of Colorado’s first community computer recycling collection program to determine the best approach to developing a sustainable, long-term computer recycling program. It is a service sorely needed in Colorado where we have the second highest number of PCs per household in the nation, according to the Colorado Business Review. The one-year pilot project is jointly funded by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the Governor’s Office of Energy Management and Conservation, and Eco-Cycle.
Keeping computers out of landfills is the primary goal of the program. Every computer contains 5 to 8 pounds of lead as well as mercury, arsenic, cadmium, beryllium, and a host of other heavy metals and toxic chemicals. When a computer is buried in a landfill, these toxic chemicals can leach into local groundwater supplies, endangering all those that depend on that water. Eco-Cycle will begin developing the infrastructures needed to prevent home computers from entering the waste stream.
A second goal is recycling and reuse: 90% of the component materials in a computer can be recycled, yet in 1998 only 3% of obsolete computers were removed from the waste stream. That means that a significant amount of valuable resources are ending up in the landfill. Given that the cost of computers goes down every day and they become obsolete more and more quickly – the average life-span is now 2 years – we’re looking at a problem that will only get dramatically larger in the future.
How big is the obsolete computer problem? The Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition estimates that over 300 million computers will become obsolete in the United States by 2005. Twenty million home personal computers became obsolete in 1998 alone, according to the National Safety Council.
Eco-Cycle hopes to collect 80,000 pounds of obsolete computer equipment during the program’s year-long pilot phase. Three business development options will be explored: marketing truckload quantities of recycled computers to end users; consolidating small quantities of computers with other collectors to cooperatively market the materials; and disassembling computers to harvest marketable components (CPUs, CD-ROMs, etc.) and sell them to secondary buyers.
The computer recycling pilot project will consist of at least three one-day computer collection events scattered throughout Boulder County over the next 12 months. The first collection will occur in Broomfield on November 18 at the Broomfield Recycling Center, and from there the program will work its way around the county. The tentative schedule includes a collection day for Longmont in February, one for Boulder in April, and one in the summer of 2001 for east county residents and those who live in the mountains. No firm dates or locations have been set beyond the Broomfield collection date, but we’ll keep you informed. We look forward to seeing you in your neighborhood – old computer in hand – sometime soon.
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