e-Wasteland

We're preparing to explore the problem of e-Waste again with Year 8 students, who have been exploring the issues of globalisation, and will now be exploring the consequence of our demands for new products...

Last year, 41.8m tonnes of so-called e-waste – mostly fridges, washing machines and other domestic appliances at the end of their life – was dumped, a UN report said.
That’s the equivalent of 1.15m heavy trucks, forming a line 23,000km (14,300 miles) long

We'll be using David Fedele's Vimeo video...


e-wasteland from David Fedele on Vimeo.

There's also this Al Jazeera report... This waste produces harmful lead and mercury, but also holds tonnes of gold and silver....
China, India, Nigeria and Ghana receive the most e-Waste. EU has banned its shipment...



There has been quite a bit in the news over the last few days about this:

Guardian article on which EU countries create the most waste.

A BBC article suggests that the majority of this waste is microwaves and dishwashers rather than mobile phones and computers as some might imagine

Some ideas for how to cut down on eWaste in this BBC article too - including swapping your own mobile phone for a slice of pizza....

Does the term e-Waste hide the reality of what this is... a pile of toxic chemicals that threatens ecosystems and human health? How can we reduce our own contributions to this problem?

And here's a nice quote from one of the comments on the Guardian article:

We live in a throw-away society the trouble is nobody seems to have worked out what to do with it when it's thrown away.