America Recycles Day’s Main Message: Begin with the End in Mind

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Libraries are filled to the brim with digital technology including PCs, printers, copiers, scanners, and more. When they work, it’s great. But sooner or later, they all go south, and now e-waste is the fastest growing category of waste according to the EPA. 

So what’s a library to do?

I’ve compiled a few ideas for your consideration. I invite you to add any suggestions or ideas that you may have to the list.

• Form a green electronics team to capture the almost overwhelming amount of critical information for time of purchase and when making end-of-life decisions.
• Check out the 9th edition of Greenpeace’s Guide to Greener Electronics, which ranks the 18 top manufacturers of electronics according to their policies on toxic chemicals, recycling, and climate change, and the Green Electronics Council, which has a certification called EPEAT that gives PCs and other electronics ratings based on good-to-know criteria.
• Read the Electronics Takeback Coalition’s annual report card, which rates different consumer electronics and computer companies on their efforts to take back and recycle electronics before making a purchase. Note: No company, in any category, received an “A” grade.
• Find a certified e-Steward recycler. E-Stewards Recyclers have committed to high standards of environmental and worker protection in the processing of e-waste.
• Check out Staples, Best Buy, and Office Depot, which have various programs in place to help you recycle your library’s electronics.
• Check out company-specific take-back programs, as well as the Electronics Manufacturers Recycling Management Company, which can show you where you can drop off electronics for recycling.

Still have a few minutes? You may want to view environmental activist Annie Leonard’s newly released “Story of Electronics” in which she takes on the electronics industry’s “design for the dump” mentality and champions product take-back to spur companies to make less toxic, more easily recyclable and longer lasting products.