Background

There is no U.S. federal law that requires the recycling of electronic waste so states are left to come up with their own initiatives and programs. 26 states have passed electronic recycling legislation but they vary in the type of approach (producer or consumer responsibility) and level of enforcement, and thus state e-waste programs vary in their level of effectiveness (measured in collection volume).

The first e-waste recycling law was passed by California, known as the Electronic Waste Recycling Act of 2003, which established the Covered Electronic Waste (CEW) Recycling Program. This program offset the cost of compliantly handling disposed of electronic devices through a consumer responsbility rather than producer responsbility approach by having consumers pay a fee for certain electronic devices at the time of purchase.

When a California consumer buys a covered electronic device (CED) from a retailer, the consumer pays a recycling fee that funds the CEW Recycling Program. Currently, consumers are charged a fee of $4 on a screen more than four inches but less than 15 inches, $5 on a screen more than 15 inches but less than 35 inches, and $6 on a screen measuring 35 inches or more. This funding then goes towards collectors and recyclers to to offset the cost of appropriate recovery, processing, and recycling activities.

Timeline

• 2000 - 405 million mobile phones sold.
• 2001 – State clarifies that cathode ray tube (CRT) devices are in fact hazardous when disposed.
• 2002 – California’s universal waste rules prohibit disposal of electronics.
• 2003 – Electronic Waste Recycling Act (SB 20) passed by Governor Gray Davis.
• 2004 – Cell Phone Recycling Act passed.
• 2005 – Covered Electronic Waste (CEW) recycling program is initiated.
• 2007 - The first generation iPhone hits the U.S. market.
• 2008 - the recycling rate for covered electronics was 58%, almost triple from 2006, when the recovery rate was at 29%.
• 2010: The Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC) estimates that of the 18 million cell phones sold in California in 2010, 3.7 million were recycled, for a 21% recycling rate.
• 2018 - LCD and LED technology for televisions and monitor screens have more or less replaced Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) devices. Technological advancement means electronic waste policy must evolve to keep up.

E-waste research & recommendations

Researchers from UCI’s economics and ecology departments conducted a survey of CA households to obtain information on what attributes of households are correlated with likelihood of recycling and querying respondents on how to better incentivize recycling of e-waste. Results showed that older, more educated individuals are more likely to recycle and that familiarity with the recycling process of any sort such as glass / bottles is a critical factor in getting people to recycle their electronics. [5] Another major incentive is convenience, as people who live more than five miles away from the nearest drop-off recycling center are less likely to recycle. Thus a good approach for building e-waste interventions would be to build on top of existing recycling programs as well as implement education programs that expose individuals to the concept of reducing and reusing at a young age.

Additional surveying was done to investigate specific recycling options to try and figure out what would work best in terms of establishing a successful recycling program. Respondents were asked to rank preferentially among options including (1) “Pay As You Throw”, (2) “Drop-Off Recycling at Regional Collection Centers”, (3) “Curbside Recycling”, (4) “Drop-Off Recycling at Retail Locations”, and (5) “Deposit-Refund Program at Retail Locations” to try and determine the effectiveness of establishing these interventions by determining the cost / convenience tradeoff and the willingness of consumers to pay for these options. The most popular option consumers were willing to adopt was drop-off recycling and the least ranked option was paying for recycling during the time of disposal [4] which indicates to any legislators that a recycling fee should be included during the time of purchase otherwise few people will bother recycling their electronics if they have to pay to do so.

According to an open town hall meeting hosted by CalRecycle, the administrative organization for the CEW program, several market trends were identified that would impact the future effectiveness of the program that should be addressed in the near future. [2] As technology becomes more advanced, the end of life stream composition is evolving. Devices are becoming more difficult to dismantle and require longer processing times while also having less recoverable material in terms of precious metals. Additionally, downstream processing outlets have become constrained, as there are increasingly fewer vendors that will buy and process recycled materials. Overseas export markets for e-plastics have also shrunk considerably over the past several years, meaning recycling revenues are further decreased.

An additional recommendation would be for California to update the consumer recycling fee established in SB20 to use a modulated fee approach. Currently California consumers pay a recycling fee on all covered electronic devices, which then are used to compensate collectors and recyclers. The modulated fee approach would decrease the tax associated with a device if it has more environmentally desirable features such as less usage of toxic material or being more easily recyclable. The intention is to extend the responsibility of electronic waste management more onto the producer by incentivizing better design of the devices in the first place. Any increases in the cost to manufacture the device due to a greener design can be offset by a decrease in the fee Californian consumers already pay. This approach is not without precedence as this modulated fee model is used in European countries to reduce plastic waste. Given the latest e-scrap industry trends, this will make the electronics industry in California much more sustainable for the long term future.