It has been almost 30 years that the mainstream computing was born and with it used to renew their equipment every 3 years while enjoying the transition from lower prices and higher performance. But this development programmed is not without consequence on the environment. In his recent guide for responsible ecosystem, the WWF gives us the figures of our insatiable thirst for new gadgets.
According to WWF, the manufacture of 1 gram chip requires 15 kg of pure water and 1 kg of various raw materials, an astounding ratio of 16 000:1 between raw materials and finished product. On the scale of a full desktop computer, the picture is more favorable since the manufacture of a PC requires "only" 100 times its weight in raw materials.
But it generates 164 kg of waste. The ecological problem is compounded by the loss of life of a PC. Then it was on average 10 years 25 years ago, she was 6 years old in 1997 and only 3 years old in 2005. This phenomenon, linked to the growing greed of software, combined with the increasing number of households with (in France the rate of equipment increases by 10% per year) led to an explosion in the number of computers for recycling.
However, channels for collecting and recycling of electronic waste are not developed. According to WWF, only 14% of 370 506 tonnes of computer equipment on the market between 2006 and 2009 were recycled. These are literally thousands of tons of pollutants found in nature. In addition to pollution, lack of recycling leads to a depletion of precious metals needed to manufacture components.
It is estimated that there were in 2005 500 million mobile phones out of use in the world that contained "7,900 tonnes of copper, 178 tonnes of silver, 17 tonnes of gold, 7.4 tons of palladium and 180 kg of platinum. The situation is worse for some items even more rare "with known deposits will be exhausted by 2 to 30 years." Finally, it still works rather well what Nokia 3310 ... 
According to WWF, the manufacture of 1 gram chip requires 15 kg of pure water and 1 kg of various raw materials, an astounding ratio of 16 000:1 between raw materials and finished product. On the scale of a full desktop computer, the picture is more favorable since the manufacture of a PC requires "only" 100 times its weight in raw materials.
But it generates 164 kg of waste. The ecological problem is compounded by the loss of life of a PC. Then it was on average 10 years 25 years ago, she was 6 years old in 1997 and only 3 years old in 2005. This phenomenon, linked to the growing greed of software, combined with the increasing number of households with (in France the rate of equipment increases by 10% per year) led to an explosion in the number of computers for recycling.
However, channels for collecting and recycling of electronic waste are not developed. According to WWF, only 14% of 370 506 tonnes of computer equipment on the market between 2006 and 2009 were recycled. These are literally thousands of tons of pollutants found in nature. In addition to pollution, lack of recycling leads to a depletion of precious metals needed to manufacture components.
It is estimated that there were in 2005 500 million mobile phones out of use in the world that contained "7,900 tonnes of copper, 178 tonnes of silver, 17 tonnes of gold, 7.4 tons of palladium and 180 kg of platinum. The situation is worse for some items even more rare "with known deposits will be exhausted by 2 to 30 years." Finally, it still works rather well what Nokia 3310 ...
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