Eco-efficiency considerations on the end-of-life of consumer electronic products

Abstract

Abstract-In order to improve the eco-efficiency at the end-of-life phase of consumer electronic products, comprehensive assessments should be made. The Quotes for environmentally WEighted RecyclabiliTY and Eco-Efficiency method (QW-ERTY/EE) developed at the Delft University of Technology is applied to aim at minimal end-of-life treatment costs against maximal environmental recovery. In this paper, the outcomes of this eco-efficiency concept are presented based on a range of improvement options like changing shredding and separation settings, plastic recycling, glass recycling, or separate sorting of certain products. The analysis of more than 75 different consumer electronic products clearly shows groups in state-of-the-art recycling performance in both environmental and economic terms and a substantial distinction between the various product categories. From there, the evaluation takes place of technical improvements in relation to current best-practice recycling. Even more, with the QWERTY/EE concept it is made possible to select and rank improvement options of current and future end-of-life processing and to determine which options bring substantial environmental gain in relation to financial investments made. For glass dominated products, an increase in glass recycling results in significant environmental improvements. The same counts for separate sorting and treatment of precious metal dominated products with a relatively high precious metal content like cellular phones. However, economies of scale are a major assumption that has to be fulfilled in this case. Other conclusions and outcomes are that plastic recycling seems only eco-efficient for large housings of appliances already undergoing disassembly due to the presence of a cathode ray tube (CRT) or liquid crystal display (LCD). For small and medium-sized housings, the extra costs of plastic recycling are high in relation to the environmental improvement realized. In most cases, dedicated shredding and separation of metal dominated products does not lead to substantial environmental or economic improvements. In general, it is shown that the various options to increase the eco-efficiency of end-of-life systems lead to very mixed environmental and economic results. As a consequence, end-of-life policy strategies should be evaluated, and in some cases revised, to support and enhance the most eco-efficient improvement options. Regarding the sensitivity of the results, it is shown that although the different environmental assessment models prioritize individual materials in a different order, the results for the improvement options on a system level are pointing in the same direction, except for plastic recycling scenarios.

The application of best available technology in dealing with Ontario's waste electric and electronic equipment : a case study

“…There is also a measurable degree of fluctuation in the level of metals found in PWBs across all categories. In some instances (such as PWBs, CRT and LCD monitors), there were three or more studies from which data could be retrieved (Huisman, 2004;Hageluken, 2006a;Keller, 2006;Mort et al, 2007;Streicher-Porte et al, 2007;and Huisman et al, 2007). In the instances of PCs, Peripherals and TVs, there were two or more studies available (Socolof et al, 2001;PHA Consulting Associates, 2006;Babu et al, 2007;Mort et al, 2007;Hageluken, 2006a;and Huisman et al, 2007).…”

“…Reg. 393/04 WEEE, which is scheduled to come into effect on April 1, 201 0. promulgated to deal with the WEEE problem (such as European Union Directive 2002/96), weight-based targets are employed in order to measure program success.Unfortunately, as noted byHuisman et al (2004),Hageluken (2006a) andHuisman et al (2007), weight-based targets may not be an ideal policy strategy as they typically lack content differentiation. For example, under such a weight-based target scheme, a kilogram of a carcinogen such as cadmium is treated with the same gravity as a kilogram of concrete.…”

One WEEE, many species: lessons from the European experience

“…The collection targets do not discriminate between products or product categories and the recycling and recovery targets do not differentiate between material types, as all targets are currently based on the physical weight of the product. However, this overlooks the fact that some products may have a lower physical weight, but higher environmental weight when looked at from an ecoefficiency perspective (Huisman et al, 2004).…”

Method of the Waste Electrical Reverse Logistics Environmental Impact Assessment Based on Rough Set Theory

“…But in the point of environmental protection, this evaluation criterion is poor. From a scientific point of view, it may lead to wrong decisions since the amount of the precious metals is very low but has a higher environmental and economic value, environment weights recycling theory provides a good method to set a starting point in the point of disposal of waste materials and replace weight weights with environment weights to assess the recyclability of the product for weighing the product end of life processing [5] . Huisman focused on the recycling of materials, thus the refurbishment and remanufacturing of waste products were outside the scope of the assessment of consuming electrical appliances.…”