Why you should recycle mobile phones 330x300

Why Recycle My Mobile Device? Smartphone Tablet etc

Banner Ad - Sign Up to make money with this list builder

Why you should recycle mobile phones and then proudly say I recycle my mobile device.
© Bellemedia | Dreamstime Stock Photos

When people ask “why recycle my mobile device“, we reply that it is important that you do recycle all mobile phones, cell phones, tablets etc. That is because recovering the gold, silver, palladium and copper found in 50 million cell phones would reduce the demand for mining fresh metals by nearly 14 tons annually, according to recycling industry experts.

Mobile Phones Contain Hazardous Chemicals

The toxic components of cell phones include the rare-earth elements, lead, mercury, cadmium and arsenic. If thrown in the trash and sent to incinerators or landfills, environmental contamination can occur from combustion and leaching into soil and groundwater.

Mobile Phones Contain What Are Known As “Conflict Minerals”

Do you know that by not recycling your smart phone, or even a very old phone in a small way you add to the world's human suffering. That's because you increase the demand for “Conflict minerals”, which are resources that are mined and used to influence and finance armed conflict, human rights abuses, and violence.ᅠAn example is the fighting in the Democratic Republic of Congo that's known to be financially supported by the profits from mining the rare-earth minerals used in electronics, including cell phones.ᅠ

The most important minerals here are tin, tantalum, tungsten and gold.

If I Recycle My Mobile Device – What That Means for the Global Environment

Have you ever considered exactly what happens to your old cellphone when your agreement ends.ᅠDo you keep it in the house, up until several years later on, it is so out of date, that you simply bin it. When these old phones are eventually thrown out, you and many other people say; “why recycle my mobile device”, because it's not worth any money any more!

But, for the benefit of future generations you should really make a point of recycling it. This may simply mean removing the SIM card and dropping it into the correct WEEE small electrical and electronic items bin at your local recycling centre. Alternatively, the newer phones and especially those that have just come out of contract and are only about two years old, will command enough money if sold to a mobile phone recycling company that it is worth doing this.ᅠ

However, many people do not provide this a second thought as they drop their old phone in the garbage, nevertheless cellphone recycling is ending up being a concern that can not be neglected due to its serious effect on the environment. The raw products, minerals and resources that are eaten to make your phone are bigger than you would think.
Simply look at these figures, the average phone consists of silver weighing as much as one and a half laptop computers, and enough gold for 50 wedding event rings. Put this together with the really short life span of these phones, and a low recycling rate and this creates a serious potential for environmental pollution.
Recycling just one Lithium Ion Battery, prevents the contamination of the equivalent of up to 3 Olympic pools, of water.
Look at it another way. Recycling one million mobile phones is like taking 33 automobiles off the road for an entire year. Recycling 42 smart phones would save the energy utilised by one family for an entire year.ᅠ

Few Mobile Phones Are Recycled

I do personally recycle my mobile device, but I am in the minority, the UK it is reckoned that only about 11% of smartphones are recycled.

According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency,

ᅠ“More than 100 million cell phones are no longer used annually. If we recycled all of them, we would save enough energy to power 18,500 U.S homes for a year.”

EPA reported that in 2009, 141 million mobile devices (including cell phones, smartphones, PDAs, and pagers) were ready no longer in use. However, only 11.7 million (about 8%) devices were collected for recycling while 129 million devices were disposed.

See more at: http://rmcp.earthworksaction.org/why_recycle

Another good way of doing your bit by recycling tech (and recouping some cash in the process), is selling your old smartphones, tablets and other tech online to a company like Plunc.

Banner Ad - Sign Up to make money with this list builder


You May Also Like These Topics...
Image has the text: "Sustainable organic waste disposal".

Sustainable Organic Waste Disposal is More Than Just a Diversion

In recent years waste management experts often talk about diverting organic waste from landfills. In this article, we explain why diversion is just the first step in a virtuous circle toward much more sustainable organic waste disposal. Read on to find out why sustainable organic waste disposal is more than just a matter of diversion. […]

Image text: "Landfill Tax Regulations UK 2021".

UK Landfill Tax Regulations – Effects and the Rate for 2021

UK Landfill Tax Regulations first came into being on October 1, 1996, when the United Kingdom government imposed a landfill levy on trash disposal in landfills. The tax's goal was, and continues to be, to encourage businesses and consumers to produce less trash, dispose of less garbage in landfills, and recover more value from trash […]

Huesker’s new FCC+ Tipper Trailer with Borger pump (Börger’s FL1036 pump).

Börger FL1036 Pumps Avoid Wasted Biogas Feedstock Trips

At first sight, this headline sounds impossible, and we admit that at first, we thought how could  Börger FL1036 Pumps (or anybody else's for that matter!) avoid wasted Biogas Feedstock trips – or trips to anywhere at all! But this is perfectly possible and highly environmentally beneficial while saving the operator a lot of transport cost. The […]

Image shows: The new way to recycle concrete using a mobile track-fitted mini crusher.

How to Recycle Concrete and Save Money at the Same Time

In  principle most experts agree on how to recycle concrete and save money. But, there has been a view in the construction industry that crushing concrete is really only for large-scale stationary crushers. Never has that been further from the truth than now. Crushing concrete on site with a mini crusher is very viable and […]

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,
Previous Post
aggregate replacement through concrete recycling 350x350
Recycling

Concrete Recycling

Next Post
why every landfill liner leaks
Landfill Problems

Why Every Landfill Liner Leaks But Not All Leakage Matters

Comments

    • Davet Jomphe
    • 08/04/2018
    Reply

    I was made aware that there’s gold nuggets in some cell phones. Are these nuggets expensive or how much is the value of it in most phones in the golds market today?

    • Pete V. Martinez
    • 14/04/2018
    Reply

    I hate seeing those devices die so I take them from the bins before they can be destroyed.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.