Turning the Toxic Tide of Printed Circuit Board E-Waste
Whitepaper addresses growing PCB e-waste management challenge in Asia, article by Jaya Myler
While the issue of single-use plastics captured the world’s attention in 2018, e-waste, which represents an urgent and arguably even more pressing challenge to the environment in Asia, avoided the glare of the spotlight. As access to electrical equipment and electronic devices increases, and with constant product improvements and innovations, the challenge of global e-waste management increases, and current efforts to control the ‘toxic tide’ of e-waste are insufficient.
Some of the materials in one component of e-waste, printed circuit boards (PCBs), are particularly toxic and difficult to recycle, and are often dumped into landfills, on open land or in water, where they pollute the soil and the water systems, damaging human health and the environment. The ubiquitous printed circuit board is in so many of the devices we use every day — if you picked up your smartphone, used your laptop, or an external hard drive, switched on your television, used a remote control or used your microwave today, then you used a PCB. And what happens to these devices when you upgrade or replace them? A new PCB Waste Management white paper examines the global e-waste challenge, and suggests how to move towards a circular economy model for e-waste, and in particular PCBs.
The newly released white paper published by Singapore-based Asia P3 Hub and PeopleNet Associates Pte Ltd in partnership with Seagate Technology, looks at the global e-waste challenge, evaluates current PCB e-waste management approaches including recycling processes, looks at the gaps and challenges and puts forward solutions to the growing PCB e-waste challenge in Asia. The report calls for urgent, collective action, and makes key recommendations on how to tackle this challenge.
Asia generates the largest amount of e-waste as a region (18.2 million metric tonnes in 2016), with China and India the largest generators. Globally, only 20 percent of e-waste is currently being collected and recycled. The rest is discarded with general waste, dumped, or retained by consumers. The vast majority of recycling is performed in the informal sector, and the recycling industry is fraught with leakages, value chain gaps, and corruption, resulting in massive amounts of toxic pollution that is harmful to humans and the environment.
PCB Waste Management White Paper Recommendations
The white paper is primarily focused on PCB recycling, and puts forward the following recommendations, in two categories, to address the issues related to PCB e-waste management.
1. Address the larger issues of circularity
Key recommendations to bring circularity to bear include:
- Designing for durability: rethinking Electrical and Electronic Equipment (EEE) design to allow replacement of parts to extend the lifespan of products
- Strengthening extended producer responsibility (EPR) programmes
- Improving collection of e-waste: private e-waste collection Companies should be encouraged; consumers need to be incentivised to recycle their e-waste; and logistics need to be simplified to remove hindrances to consumer buy-in
- Integrating the formal and informal recycling sectors
2. Act on key leverage points
The white paper recommends steps that can be taken at key leverage points to begin to have impact in the near future. They include:
- Enhancing certification programmes, including a tiered certification system
- Supporting new technologies to address PCB materials and recycling methods. These include: Biodegradable boards, PCB recycling with molten salt technology, and more integrated chipsets.
- Developing cheaper fully sealed incinerators
- Investing in a recycling start-up fund to identify and scale viable solutions
Co-Creating Solutions to the e-Waste Challenge in Asia
The white paper comprised phase one of a research project. Phase two of the project was a closed-door regional multi-sector roundtable to facilitate discussion and ideation among key stakeholders, examine the white paper findings, and take a combinatorial approach to generating solutions to the challenge of PCB waste.
The PCB Waste Management Roundtable, convened by the consortium, was an invite-only event held at the Seagate Design Centre, The Shugart in Singapore in December 2018. Around 30 senior and executive-level representatives from the technology industry, NGO sector, and government organisations participated in the dynamic event, with attendees coming together from Singapore, the United States, Malaysia, Indonesia and China to discuss this global challenge.
Asia P3 Hub along with its partners now plans to take some of the proposed solutions from the research project to the next stage, and work to co-create solutions to the e-waste challenge in Asia. Initially we’re focusing on three of the recommendations to come out of the white paper and roundtable:
- Supporting new technologies for PCB materials and recycling;
- Integrating the formal and informal recycling sectors; and
- Improving e-waste collection.
We’d love to hear from you if you’re interested in getting involved or championing one of these solutions, or if you’ve got a great idea that you’d like to share with us, please do get in touch!
Article was written by Jaya Myler, Asia P3 Hub’s Communications and Marketing Consultant.
Jaya Myler is a non-profit manager with more than 12 years of experience working with international NGOs, corporate and consumer brands, in both developed and developing country settings. She has a strong background in managing projects and programs, and advocacy and communications, and experience working in environmental, education, and WASH NGOs. She is passionate about water and sanitation, education and poverty alleviation. She has experience working on multi-sector partnerships with NGOs, corporates, academia and governments, and is a big believer in the power of cross-sector collaboration to drive innovation and achieve impact. She holds a Master of Media Practice. She is currently Asia P3 Hub’s Communications and Marketing Consultant.
