In just five years, all of the world’s refrigerators, televisions, cell phones, computers and electronic devices destined for disposal or recycling will grow by 33 percent, according to a study released by the United Nations Sunday.
The mountain of used electrical and electronic devices, known as “e-waste,” is expected to grow from 48.9 million metric tons worldwide in 2012 to 65.4 million metric tons in 2017; the weight equivalent of 200 Empire State Buildings or 11 Great Pyramids of Giza, the study says.
“Although there is ample information about the negative environmental and health impacts of primitive e-waste recycling methods, the lack of comprehensive data has made it hard to grasp the full magnitude of the problem,” said Ruediger Kuehr, executive secretary of the U.N.’s Solving the E-Waste Problem (StEP) Initiative, which conducted the study.
E-waste is harmful to the environment, the StEP Initiative notes on its website, because those products can contain toxic substances. When those electronic products are burned or put in a landfill, those toxic substances – such as mercury, cadmium and lead – can seep out.
The United States topped the list of the 184 countries analyzed for the total volume of e-waste generated each year, at 9.4 million tons in 2012; followed by China, with 7.2 million tons. By comparison, the U.S. Environment Protection Agency reported the U.S. generated 1.9 million to 2.2 million tons of e-waste in 2005.
Source: U.S. News & World Report