A total of 59.4 million tonnes of e-waste were produced in 2022, with estimates indicating a surge to 74 million tonnes by 2030.
As part of this years Global Recycling Day, Wisetek UK & Wisetek Store are calling on both businesses & individuals to commit to improving their e-waste recycling efforts.
“The most recent figures we have available shows that only 17.4% of e-waste was properly documented and recycled over a 12 month period, that is a huge amount of potentially hazardous materials that are just being left to pollute the environment.” Notes Gary McCarthy, Director of Global Sales Operations at Wisetek. “Think of how many smartphones there are currently in the world, think of how many old devices you may have laying around your own home, gathering dust in a drawer – It’s essential that these devices are properly recycled, if sent to landfill your average iPhone will take around 1’230 years to fully decompose, if at all”
Every one million smartphones that are recycled recovers roughly –
- 35’274 pounds of copper
- 772 pounds of silver
- 75 pounds of gold
- 33 pounds of palladium
“Most modern electronics contain harmful and toxic materials like mercury, lead, cadmium, lithium and beryllium. When these devices are sent to landfill, these toxins are released and begin to leach into the soil, over time subsequently reaching the water table. This devastates the local ecosystem.”
Wisetek, who are the global leaders in Business Computer Recycling and Secure Data Destruction operate a 0% landfill policy, ensuring the minimisation of the amount of e-waste sent to landfills across the world.
“We work with clients in order to refurbish, remarket or recycled any unused or unwanted IT assets in order to minimise the amount of harmful e-waste generated. We are extremely proud to operate within the circular economy model – So many perfectly good devices & components are thrown away on a daily basis, every redundant IT asset, regardless of its perceived value or state, has a re-use value, whether it be fully refurbished or via parts. Through our work we’re happy to provide devices like refurbished Macbooks, and refurbished tablets to the markets”
Global Recycling Day, which was U.N. recognised in 2018, strives to boost awareness about recycling methods through a variety of initiatives across the globe. It is estimated that by 2030 the recycling industry will have saved approximately 1 billion tonnes of CO2 emissions.
