E-waste solutions

We love our gadgets. Every room in the house has them, from computers to TVs, fax machines to printers. DVD players, keyboards, mice, chargers, cell phones, video game systems. We're increasingly dependent on anything that plugs in, lights up and is programmable.

And the holidays brought a whole lot more of the stuff, relegating the old electronics to the garage.

Many of us have good intentions to get things recycled. We know we're not supposed to put them in the garbage can. But where do we take them? Many thrift shops aren't equipped to deal with them and don't want them. Does it mean we have to haul electronics all the way to the county dump in Petaluma in order to be a good citizen? Meanwhile, the stuff multiplies like mosquitoes after a rain, and we wrestle with our inner demons that tempt us to toss things in the trash and close the lid.

The bad news is, pretty much all electronics — anything that has a logic circuit or chip and “thinks” as opposed to a standard electrical device — is considered hazardous waste and needs to be properly disposed of. It's actually illegal in the state of California for a private individual, even a homeowner, to toss e-waste in the municipal trash.

The solder that holds together the wiring and circuit boards in old electronics contains lead. Some may also contain cadmium, arsenic or mercury. The glass in old TVs and monitors with cathode ray tubes contains four to eight pounds of lead, said Jeff Hunts, manager of the state's electronics recycling program.

“Even the new LCDs that many people have as desktop monitors or big screen TVs are backlit with tiny fluorescent tubes that contain small amounts of mercury vapor, Hunt said. “Some are lit by LEDs. But the rest of the circuit may be hazardous.”

The good news is, there are more places than you might imagine that now take e-waste. For the past five years retailers have collected a fee ($8, $16 or $25 depending on size) for each “covered electronic device” sold, including televisions and computer monitors that contain a cathode ray tube, or CRT, laptop computers, and liquid crystal display, or LCD, desktop computer monitors, plasma and LCD televisions, and portable DVD players.

The state uses that money to pay recyclers who accept e-waste and submit claims with proper documentation to prove the waste wasn't brought in from out of state.

Those payments have generated more entrepreneurial opportunities for recycling, from big firms like ECS of Santa Clara that has the contract to recycle Sonoma County's e-waste to local for-profit collectors like Global Material Recovery Services of Santa Rosa and CRC, also of Santa Rosa, which takes the green concept even further by not only recycling, but by reusing and refurbishing as much as possible and making that equipment available to nonprofits.

Recycling is great, but that should be a last resort, said Steve Wyatt, the director of CRC, or Computer Recycling Center, which brings in 1 million to 1.8 million pounds of electronics every month.

“If you reuse one computer and monitor, you save the equivalent of $670 in energy alone, which is almost half a year's cost for a single person. You multiply that by how many computers there are in the U.S. and it's a staggering amount.”

While they may seem outdated or nonfunctioning, a lot of equipment is still usable, Wyatt stressed. More than 90 percent of flat panel screens can be repaired, and CRC successfully refurbishes more than 80 percent of laptops as long as they don't have broken glass.

“But even with broken glass, we may be able to use the rest of the parts to refurbish another LCD panel or another laptop,” Wyatt said.

Processors can be cleaned off to run faster, memory can be added to make them more functional and hard drives replaced. Parts can be removed from one system to save another, much like an organ transplant. So don't assume that your equipment is completely worthless. Treat it well even when you're done with it. Until you can recycle it, keep it in a place where it won't be damaged or exposed to the elements or critters.

While many thrift shops lack the skilled staff to deal in old computers for re-sale and reject them as donations, the Salvation Army and Goodwill both gladly take old electronics, not for their thrift stores but to resell in massive bulk to legitimate recyclers. The ubiquity of their drop-off locations makes it fairly convenient to get rid of your own accumulation without having to wait for a special e-waste event in your community or without having to give over a lot of gas and time on a long drive.

Goodwill Industries of the Redwood Empire has taken in more than 2 million pounds of old electronics in the last four years, said Mark Ihde, who took it on as a “pet project” when he became CEO in 2006 after noting the growing stacks in his own garage.

“We ship out a 53-foot trailer once a week filled with palletized electronics,” he added. “We get a reimbursement from our recycler for the amount of product we provide, which offsets our costs. But I think it's a good community service project as well.”

Making sure your e-waste winds up in the hands of responsible reusers or recyclers who follow the law is also critical.

While there is a legitimate international market for the commodities that can be gleaned from e-waste, there is a shady side where unwanted e-waste winds up in places like China and India and developing countries “where there are horrific end-of-life practices with women and children busting apart these devices,” said Hunts.

“The EPA estimates that 80 percent of e-waste is exported to developing countries,” said Pat Potter, regional account manager for ECS Refining of Santa Clara, which collected 1.5 million pounds of it from Sonoma County in 2009. “The reason Sonoma County picked us is that we're a processor as opposed to a recycler. When material comes into our facilities, it leaves in a commodity form.”

Consumers also need to be wary about protecting any personal data, which can remain on a hard drive even if it is deleted. For that reason, some people remove their hard drives before dropping off old computers. Even if you don't remove it, Wyatt stressed CRC cleans off all hard drives before reusing them.

The Goodwill's Ihde, a career law enforcement man and former Sonoma County sheriff, also is acutely aware of security concerns with information on computers.

“Every hard drive we get is shredded so there are no identify theft kind of issues,” he said. “We just wanted to make sure all the sensitive information is destroyed.”

You can reach Staff Writer Meg McConahey at 521-5204 or meg.mcconahey@pressdemocrat.com.