[wordup] New E-Waste Solution a Mine Idea

Wed Jun 19 12:31:13 EDT 2002

Via: Simon Horsburgh <simon.horsburgh at stonebow.otago.ac.nz>
From: http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,52988,00.html
More: http://SciTechDaily.com

 New E-Waste Solution a Mine Idea
 By Kendra Mayfield

 2:00 a.m. June 7, 2002 PDT

 Mark Small has a radical solution for dealing with the glut of old
computers, cell phones, DVDs and other electronic waste: mining.

 Rather than allowing electronic junk to simply amass in landfills,
Small wants to deposit huge volumes of e-waste into abandoned open pit
mines.

 Using the same techniques that miners use to process copper ore,
valuable materials such as copper, iron, glass, gold and plastic could
be extracted from electronic scrap.

 "The products that we make (in the electronics industry) are made in an
incredibly efficient way," said Small, vice president of corporate
environment, safety and health for Sony Electronics. "We have to use
that same type of philosophy in dealing with the end-of-life issue."

 There are more than 550,000 abandoned hardrock mines in the nation. A 
single open pit mine has the capacity to hold 72 billion computers,
Small said.

 Instead of viewing obsolete computer monitors and televisions as
defunct sources of cathode ray tubes, "We should look at it as a
commodity," Small said.

 Mining is the "best, most efficient way to process materials with low
value content (like e-waste)," Small said. "There's essentially no cost
in this."

 Electronic waste isn't that big in terms of quantity or volume. In
fact, mining produces approximately 300 times more waste than
electronics does every year, Small said.

 E-waste is often richer in rare metals than virgin materials,
containing 10 to 50 times higher copper content than copper ore. A cell
phone contains five to 10 times higher gold content than gold ore, Small
said.

 Small's solution could be an alternative to small-scale regional
recycling programs that are employed today.

 While some vendors have employed successful domestic computer take-
back programs, other manufacturers ship electronic junk overseas to
China, India and Pakistan.

 By using mining techniques, "there's no need to ship e-waste overseas,"
Small said. "You can process it right here."

 E-waste mining can take place anywhere. The process could be done on a 
large concrete pad, rather than an old pit mine.

 Small says e-waste mining is both economically and environmentally
sustainable. The method could be used only in mines that are void of
groundwater problems.

 "It would be foolish to process in an area that could cause a
contamination problem," Small said.

 But the cost of collecting and transporting material limits the sheer
volume of e-waste that is ready to be processed.

 "The big issue is we don't have enough material now," Small said. "As
soon as we get more material, this could be done."

 Only a system that allows for mass production will be able to address
the proliferation of new technologies that may soon become obsolete,
Small said.

 "We need a system to handle the 20-30 million TVs that are produced a 
year," Small said.

 Small's idea could mark a dramatic shift from the traditional method of
 disassembling electronics.

 "It's definitely out-of-the-box thinking," said Steve Changaris,
northeast region manager for the National Solid Wastes Management
Association.

 Still, it could take 5 to 10 years to accumulate enough materials to be
mined.

 If a huge volume of e-waste material can be aggregated to reach a
critical mass and mining can be implemented cost-effectively, then
Small's proposal could succeed.

 "Some state or some jurisdiction is going to try this," Changaris said.
"I believe there's a distinct possibility that this could work."

 But while Small's idea could be less costly than traditional
electronics recycling, critics say that it could add to the mining
industry's devastating impact on the environment.

 "I don't believe that the environmental community would allow us to
dump our electronics and add to the mining waste," said Robin
Ingenthron, vice president of ElectroniCycle Inc.

 Small's proposal "shines a light on how atrocious the standards for
mining are," Ingenthron said.

 Even improper recycling poses less of an environmental threat than
mining raw materials to produce the rare metals found in electronics,
Ingenthron said.

 According to the Environmental Protection Agency's 2000 Toxics Release
Inventory, the hardrock mining industry is the nation's largest toxic
polluter. In 2000, the mining industry released 3.34 billion pounds --
or 47 percent -- of all toxics released by U.S. industry.

 "Pound for pound, open pit mining is the most-subsidized,
most-polluting, lowest-employment-generating business in the world,"
Ingenthron said.

 Mining precious materials from the Earth requires 30 percent more
energy than recycling them from old computers. Those economics have
caused recycling practices to constantly improve as nations develop.

 "Sure, we need to shut down a few lazy recyclers," Ingenthron said.
"But even the worst recycling sites are superior to mining. Mining is
much harder to remediate and make right. It's fairly easy to recycle
correctly."

 The General Mining Law of 1872 established current mining standards.
The law allows companies to mine publicly owned minerals for free and
pay no more than $5 an acre for mineral-rich lands. If that law is
repealed, then mining for e-waste might be more costly.

 "The only reason why (mining e-waste) sounds like a good idea is
because of how cheap it is to meet the standards of the 1872 law,"
Ingenthron said.

 "As long as the 1872 Mining Law gives the gold, copper, silver and lead
away for free, we will have to charge a fee to recycle that material
from used electronics. We should be able to recycle for free, on the
value of the rare metals."

 Although Small's idea would produce less waste than getting raw
material out of hard rock, re-use in secondary material in glass and
plastics would be lost, Ingenthron said.

 "Of course recycling would be cheaper if we lowered our standards to
those of the mining industry. You could drop monitors into open pits of
arsenic and cyanide, and walk away from the residue after you got the
copper and gold out. But it makes more sense to raise mining up to the
standards of recycling."