E-waste-ful

Our friends at ‘Recycle A Phone’, posted a very interesting article the other day about smart-phones and the Lithium-ion batteries used in them. We haven’t really discussed specific varieties of batteries and their associated devices much. Smart-phones are a particularly prevalent issue involved in e-waste, because of their rising popularity and relatively high turn-over.

Smartphones use Lithium-ion batteries which are more environmentally friendly to mine and process. Old phones use Nickel based batteries and are more harmful to the environment. I feel like one the positives about Lithium-ion batteries is also the negatives. In Australia, we have a large resource of Lithium (for now), this also means recycling them is not economically viable as it costs less to mine new Lithium.

I think this is very indicative of the industry’s attitudes towards to recycling. It’s more about what is financially sound in the present than looking toward the future and saving resources. But Lithium prices are rising and are set to keep rising. As new phones are created and developed, so will demand and eventually your stunning new iPhone 5s will look like the Nokia 2100. (Remember this baby?… snake II anyone?)

There are options out there for instance, as I’ve mentioned before Mobile Muster. Also, if you’ve watched our video post (here) you’ll know that Sydney City Council offers recycling for phones, batteries and old light-globes.

The article also mentioned some great tips about saving your phones battery life. Although I keep harking on about recycling, extending a batteries life is also part of limiting the amount we go through. My favourites of the article where:

• Don’t let your phone drop below 20%
• Don’t charge your battery overnight

To find out why these are important make sure you visit the article.

Mobile phones as well as computers, TV’s and batteries are classified as e-waste (electronic waste) and is the world’s fastest growing waste stream, rising 3-5% a year.  It’s crazy how much time and money we invest in developing new products without tapping into the resource of materials we already have.

What do you guys think? Should mobile phone brands be re-using materials of old phones to make new ones? How many of you recycled your old phone the last time you upgraded?

-Lexie