A Brief History and Update on
Life Cycle Environmental
Implications of Electronics
H. Scott Matthews
Carnegie Mellon University
An Interesting Problem
• Information and communications technology
(ICT) products and the systems that use them are a “double-edged sword”
• On one hand, they lead to environmental
problems and concerns
• However using them can allow us to significantly
improve our use of resources, energy, etc.
• Finding the balance requires a detailed,
Sales of Computers
(1980-2003)
0 20 40 60 80 100 120 1401980 84 88 92 96 00 02
Year
Units (millions)
U.S. Japan APAC EMEA
Life-Cycle Assessment (LCA)
• A concept and methodology to evaluate the environmental effects of
a product or activity holistically, by analyzing the whole life cycle of a particular product, process, or activity (U.S. EPA, 1993).
Motivations Over Time
•
Concerns related to end-of-life (EOL)
equipment (early 1990s)
•
“Gloom and doom studies”
– Carnegie Mellon University Estimates of PCs landfilled (1991, 97)
– SVTC, Basel Action Network E-waste reports (2003)
EOL / Disposal Concerns
For Electronics
• Toxic substances such as lead could leach
into soil and contaminate groundwater.
• Technological advances could accelerate the
turnover of TVs and computers.
• Rapid advances could lead to storage,
Europe: RoHS/WEEE
Directives
• The primary global motivation
• RoHS: bans or restricts certain substances of concern (e.g. Lead)
• WEEE: puts in place systems to require takeback and handling of EOL electrical and electronic
products (not just PCs!)
• Passed in last few years at EU level
– But each EU country responsible for local definition, legislation, enforcement
TVs and Computer Monitors
• Electronics (used to) share critical components
– Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) – CRT screen contains lead
– Protects the user from radiation
– Lead weighs from four to eight pounds
– Newer LCD screens have less problems but have other concerns (e.g. mercury in bulbs?)
• Next series of slides gives specific data collected
from one large state (Florida) about the magnitude of the problem
Residential Length and Use of
Disposal Practices -
Computers
• 63% of Florida’s households own a computer.
• 35% of residents 65+ years old have a
computer in the home compared to 80% of residents 18 to 34 years.
• Fewer than 3% of residents had broken
monitors in their home.
• Computer owners will handle broken monitors
Residential Awareness of
Hazardous Materials
•
63% of residents are unaware of the
hazards posed by CRTs.
•
Women were the least likely to be aware
of the potential threat posed by CRTs to
household or family.
•
Only 15% of residents were aware of
Residential Preferences
for Recycling
• 44% of residents would prefer to recycle TVs
and computer monitors at a donation center.
• 58% of residents don’t want to pay anything
for recycling electronics.
• If a fee is imposed:
– 50% of residents would prefer to have the fee imposed at the time of discard
– 15% at the time of purchase,
Educating the Public
About Recycling
• Residents don’t consider the CRT issue urgent
and 70% don’t want additional information.
• Younger residents (18-34) were the most
interested in recycling information.
• Residents rated county/city recycling programs
as preferred education method for recycling info.
• TV and Radio were stated as the best media
CMU Dell Event Context
•
A few hundred people, 50 tons collected
– About half from a few large groups (school districts, etc.)
– Thus a few hundred individuals brought about 25 tons.
•
How much of the Pittsburgh-area
e-waste did we likely collect?
The Evolving Electronics
Infrastructure
•
The Evolution
– Demanufacturers/Entrepreneurs – Corporate Recovery Programs
– Government Regulatory Discussions
– Local County Government Pilot Programs – Government Bans or Regulations
– Media Coverage
Manufacturer Actions
• Hewlett-Packard (HP) and IBM have long been
industry leaders
– Were amongst first companies to develop in-house electronics recycling facilities
– Were first to offer publicly available takeback and recycling programs (for a fee)
– Unclear what volume of recycled product and revenue streams look like
State Actions (2005)
• After more than 10 years of waiting, it seems that
several states poised to pass legislation about takeback/recycling
– California is often a leader at state-level environmental management (e.g. automobile emissions)
– Other states look to California for leadership
– California’s current plan not friendly to manufacturers - some headquartered in the state (e.g. HP)
Some Concerns
•
Computer recycling IS NOT FREE
– There are many costs associated with logistics, handling, demanufacturing
– Actual cost on order of $10-$20 per unit – Free events may send wrong signals to
people about costs of recycling
Beyond End-of-Life Issues
•
In last 5 years, focus of much research
has moved from EOL to sustainability of
information and communications
technology (ICT) systems
•
Expectation is that hardware issues will
eventually be solved - but what will
What is sustainability?
•
Sustainability is a concept related to
managing growth
•
“Meeting the needs of the present
Press: Optimists vs.
Pessimists
•
Energy consumption of Internet
– Mills “Dig More Coal” vs. Romm/ Koomey – Study claimed that 10% of US electricity
use was from the Internet
– Later disproved but still gets much attention
•
Effects of Hardware Production
System Losses
36.3 GJ Electricity Grid 10%
Distribution/ Transmission
32.7 GJ
Customer
Power
Supply 40%
19.6 GJ We lose, on average, 80% of
Power Naps
• Campus initiative to set power management on
computers/monitors (10-20,000 computers!)
• Electricity use of computer equipment:
– Desktop Computer: 110 W – CRT Monitor: 80 W
– LCD Monitor: 24 W
• Unlike PCs, monitors can be turned off quickly, easily,
painlessly, and temporarily
– Turning off monitors saves 72% of desktop energy
• Could also save cooling energy use in summer from
Growth of Retail E-commerce
• US DOC beganmeasuring and reporting retail
e-commerce in March 2000
– 4Q 03 = $17 Billion, up 25% from 4Q 02 – Only 2% of retail
purchases ($918 B)
QuickTime™ and a
TIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor are needed to see this picture.
–Note the following are not considered retail (and thus also not counted)
Will E-commerce Improve or
Degrade the Environment?
•
Pro -
– reduce private and commercial travel - avoid shopping trips,
– remove transaction inefficiencies, – reduce logistic and manufacturing
inefficiencies,
Will E-commerce Improve or
Degrade the Environment?
• Con -
– overhead of Internet infrastructure - electricity use increase, computers, switches, etc.
– shift to high impact travel modes,
– reduce scale economies - smaller shipment sizes, – stimulate growth,
Summary Environmental
Impacts (per-book basis)
Trad. E-Com.
Energy (MJ)
115
105
Conventional Air (kg)
0.2
0.1
Hazardous Waste (kg)
0.2
0.2
•
Previously measured wired, wireless,
and total electricity use of CMU
campus network
•
Total: ‘network’ uses 5% of campus
electricity (~5 MkWh / yr)
–Wireless ‘equipment’: 5-10x less electricity than wired
•
While not
purely
generalizable, an
indicator of the potential energy
efficiency of wireless
Wired vs. Wireless electricity
(W per subscriber)
Thus, electricity use ‘per subscriber’ will rapidly favor
•
‘Efficiency’ of wireless (versus wired)
communications is irrelevant!
•
For foreseeable future, we will have
need for wired networks (if nothing
else, to make long-range mobile calls!)
•
This dependency will limit our ability
to realize energy savings from
wireless
–i.e., until we ‘pull the plug’, we are using more total energy to have both to use
