Gordon,
This is in response to the second half of your e-mail.  See below.
Bev
RIM

Disposal of electronic waste. On a totally unrelated topic, I was
recently asked to speak at the National Academies in Washington DC on
the subject of disposal of electronic waste. The other speaker was Ted
Smith of Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition, which he founded in 1982. As
subscribers to this forum will know, I took the position that the best
way of handling e-waste is to treat it as conventional municipal solid
waste - i.e., to not coerce people to pay to recycle it.  (Voluntary
recycling is fine, but activists shouldn't try to force their beliefs on
unbelievers.)
- A good way, but I am not sure it is the best way, even with my
research showing that ain't much going to be moving out of the landfill.
I have seen a crackjack recycling facility that Noranda has in Toronto.

Mr. Smith implies that e-waste is too dangerous to burn or bury (he says
that electronic products contain a "witch's brew" of toxic chemicals).
- True, but so does sodium chloride.  More sensationalistic talk.

 For years he and like-minded people have been as busy as termites in
promoting government-coerced recycling in various states in the US to
prevent ordinary disposal. 
- This is SO funny! Termites put out a tremendous amount of carbon
dioxide. 

Also, he expresses great concern about the way in which e-waste from the
US and other countries is being recycled in third-world countries. He
provides ample evidence that the people doing the recycling there are
polluting their environment. He thinks that it is manifestly wrong for a
rich country to contribute to pollution in poor countries by allowing
its e-waste to be recycled there.
- I agree with him. I know you don't.

 (In effect, rich countries also pollute third-world countries by buying
metals mined there, but he hasn't called for a ban on importing such
metals - so far.) 
- Good point!

In spite of the obvious damage to the environment, it is not clear how
many people - if any - are being poisoned. SVTC in 2002 and Greenpeace
in 2005 visited some recycling sites and took lots of samples of the
soil and water that showed horrible pollution. You can read all about it
at the SVTC web site. Curiously, during neither visit were samples of
recycler blood or urine taken, and so they are left warning us about
poisoning "risk" instead of showing us poisoning victims. 
- They should - in any real study, but I would expect a lot of this was
done surreptitiously without Chinese government approval.  But in the
BAN movie they show people dissolving circuit boards with nitric acid,
so no blood test or urine test is going to show lung damage.

Mr. Smith's solution is to prohibit the export of e-waste from the US.
He likes to say that the people engaged in this recycling should not
have to choose between poverty and poison. What he does not say is that
since he can't get them to recycle responsibly he wants to choose for
them - poverty.
- I think this is too simplistic, on both sides of the argument.  I'm
not very good at debating, Gordon, and you stopped me dead with this one
when we met last time.  I expect no one has even tried to educate the
people to do it even a marginally better way.  If we are going to ship
stuff, someone should be providing some how-to's (not just out of sight,
out of mind).  And when were we responsible for their poverty?  And I
still think we should be responsible for our own mess.  If we like
pretty shiny things like crows, then we should put it in our own nest,
or at least under our own tree.  Why should we ship things that help
make it worse, even if we are not the ones wacking the ends off CRTs by
hand?
 
However, it is not clear is how much his solution would help. There is
plenty of e-waste being produced (and recycled) in third-world
countries, 
- True, but that doesn't make it right.  That is like saying everyone
else does it, so if I do it...

and it is not likely that a prohibition on export would stop smuggling.
European Union countries have had such a ban ("Basel Convention") in
place for nearly a decade, and yet SVTC acknowledges that that they
found e-waste from those countries in China and India. In the US, how
many Homeland Security officials are likely to be assigned to trying to
catch people smuggling out e-waste instead of trying to catch people
smuggling in narcotics and terrorist bombs and missiles? 
-I hope NONE.

How many would you assign?
- ZERO

One is left with the suspicion Mr. Smith knows that his proposal is not
likely to make much difference in third-world pollution (or poisonings),
but he hopes that the foundations that provide SVTC with its major
source of income will believe that the effort is worth contributing to. 
- Probably

One also suspects that his real goal is to increase business for
domestic e-waste recyclers. As reporters are admonished, "follow the
money". How might e-waste recyclers express their gratitude for Mr.
Smith's efforts? It isn't just industrialists that have to ensure a
continuing cash flow to keep their organization in existence. 
- Boy, that's pretty cynical, but with some foundation. Also, I hope you
are referring to money for his organization and not for his own pocket.
Many enviros have their heart in the right place, but go off on a
tangent and use sensational language (the sky is falling!) to try and
get heard.  It twists the truth and turns off anyone that is really
thinking about the subject.  

A presentation based on my talk at the National Academies can be found
at http://www7.nationalacademies.org/policyfellows/Events.html.
- I will read it.

Gordon Davy 

Baltimore, MD 

[log in to unmask]

410-993-7399 


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