The Story Of Electronics…Designed For The Dump
Once upon a time, in the not so distant future, in a town near you….an evil force has taken over the world. This is The Story of Electronics…or electronic waste to be specific.
The latest internet video release by Annie Leonard’s Story of Stuff Project employs a simple but never “dumbed-down” communication style. “The Story of Electronics” provides all consumers of electronics with an overview of the life-cycle of our electronic gadgetry and the environmental challenges presented by the IT age.
The 8 minute video above is full of facts regarding the growing problem of electronic waste due to rapid obsolescence of our electronic gear, and the lack of environmentally safe programs to recycle the millions of tons of eScrap that the US produces each year. Annie’s main point is that the majority of today’s consumer electronics are “designed for the dump”; meaning that many manufacturers design their products using toxic materials, knowing that they will either break, or become obsolete within a relatively short period of time.
Cell phones are a perfect example. How many people do you know who carry the same cell phone for more than a year or two at the most? How many old cell phones do you have collecting dust in a box somewhere? Where do you think the majority of these cell phones end up? You guessed it…the dump! What about fixing your broken gadgets? Forget about it. It costs more to fix most of them than it does to replace them with a brand new model.
Unfortunately in our society, capitalism trumps environmentalism. Corporations are concerned with making money, not saving the environment. While there are increasingly more green businesses and sustainable products on the market today than there were 5 years ago, they are still the minority. The main reason is that it can be expensive to go green. Green products are typically sold at a premium because the materials and processes used in manufacturing is more costly…or is it? If you consider the cost to our environment, the cost of disposing of used electronics properly, the cost of cleaning up toxic chemicals and hazardous metals, and the cost to consumers who buy products that only last a few years at the most…I would say it’s less expensive in the long run to produce sustainable products that can be upgraded rather than replaced.
So the next time you consider your next electronic purchase, do your research and try to shop green! Think about the obscene amount of natural resources used to make one little gadget that’s destined for the trash…and if you’re going to upgrade, at least recycle your old electronics.