E-waste: Current Practices, Regulations and Future Report

This report provides a comprehensive overview of e-waste, encompassing its generation, hazardous characteristics, and regulatory frameworks. It begins by quantifying the substantial amounts of e-waste generated globally, emphasizing the presence of valuable metals in electronic devices. The report then delves into the adverse health effects associated with exposure to hazardous substances found in e-waste, such as lead, cadmium, and mercury, highlighting their impact on cognitive functions, neurological development, and organ health. Furthermore, the report examines existing regulatory requirements for e-waste management, including the roles of various governmental agencies and community standards. It assesses current practices in e-waste handling, including recycling, reuse, and disposal methods, while also evaluating the effectiveness of current regulations in protecting public health and the environment. The report concludes by advocating for enhanced regulatory measures, including the elimination of toxic chemicals from electronic products and the promotion of convenient recycling programs.

e-waste

Contents
• How much e-waste is generated?..................................................................................................2
• Hazardous characteristics of e-waste............................................................................................2
• Regulatory requirements for e-waste............................................................................................3
• What currently happens to e-waste?..............................................................................................3
• Is current regulation enough to protect the public from e-waste both here and abroad?..............4
References........................................................................................................................................5

• How much e-waste is generated?
As per the analysis, it is seen that there is an e-waste generation from the discarded TV,
computers including the printer, scanner, fax machines. With this, there are issues related to the
metric tons of e-waste where the cell phones and the other electronic items contain a high
amount of metals like the gold or silver (Al-Anzi et al., 2017). In 2014, it was seen that
approximately 41.8 million tons of e-waste was generated with the quantity that included 12.8
million tons of the other small equipment where 11.8 million were the large equipment as well.
Here, there were 6.5 million tons of the total global e-waste generation in 2014 which was
mainly treated with the national electronic take-back systems. Here, US generated 11.7 million
tons of e-waste in 2014, where the EPA also claim about the e-waste that is from the screens and
the monitors. There is a need to work over the wastes from mobile phones, TVs and the
computers which are recycled completely (Breivik et al., 2014).
• Hazardous characteristics of e-waste
The hazardous waste has an adverse effect of the exposure of lead which includes the impaired
cognitive function with some cognitive functions, behavioural disturbance and the attention
deficits with hyperactivity. It also effects the children where the damage is of the nervous
systems that is susceptible to the damage mainly due to the lead, cadmium and the mercury. The
other health effects include the impairments due to the sensory approach, memory loss and the
muscle weakness (Dutta et al., 2017). There is a major exposure that cause the fatal deficits in
the motor function attention and the verbal domains. The inhalation of the cadmium can directly
cause the damage to the lungs which is associated to the deficiency in cognition learning,
behaviour and the neuromotor skills in children. The evidences are about the inhibit cell

prohibition which cause the cell membrane lesion with DNA single strand breaks as well. The
health effects include the damage to the liver, kidney and heart (Johnson et al., 2017). It also
leads to the impairing development of the nervous system, problems of the thyroid and the liver
problems.
• Regulatory requirements for e-waste
The compliance requirements are set with the Electronic Redux where there are different
services of the State Recycling and Electronic Waste Laws for England. The Federal Electronic
Waste Laws with the U.S. EPA (Environmental Protection Agency works on handling the
electronics management. There are different participants with the expertise for the multinational
environmental and the human health issues. Here, there are regulated community standards and
groups to include the generators for hazardous waste, with proper government regulations. EPA
includes the comprehensive programs where the hazardous waste is managed from the time it is
generated.
• What currently happens to e-waste?
Some waste is possible to recycle, but some of them contain the environmental problems as well.
The recyclers tend to sell the scavenged metal from the electronic equipment but the process to
retrieve the usable metals is toxic. The recycling is important, reuse of the product is efficient,
and some products could be refurbished as well. The high-tech separation device is to take out
the usable metals which could also be sent to the smelter. Some people tend to sell it by repairing
it, at the cheaper prices as well (Wang et al., 2013). In US, there is a little regulation of e-waste
where less than 20% is recovered from recycling. Hence, some of the waste goes to the landfills
and the incineration, which tends to pollute the environment. The storage issues are also when

one serves the delay in the day with discarding and reducing the changes to be reduced
effectively.
• Is current regulation enough to protect the public from
e-waste both here and abroad?
No according to me, there is a need to focus that the electronic companies eliminate the worst
toxic chemicals from the products and try to recycle. The generated demands for the latest
mobile phone has been able to make a huge profit from the sales perspectives but could not
reduce the issues (Dutta et al., 2017). Hence, to address the rising tide, there is a need to work
over the free and convenient recycling of the products to the customers. Here, the companies are
also seen to be unwilling to do the tough legislation that needs to make sure with safely recycling
the products.

References
Al-Anzi, B. S., Al-Burait, A. A., Thomas, A., & Ong, C. S. (2017). Assessment and modeling of E-waste
generation based on growth rate from different telecom companies in the State of
Kuwait. Environmental Science and Pollution Research, 1-15.
Breivik, K., Armitage, J. M., Wania, F., & Jones, K. C. (2014). Tracking the global generation and exports
of e-waste. Do existing estimates add up?. Environmental science & technology, 48(15), 8735-
8743.
Dutta, D., & Goel, S. (2017). Electronic Waste (E-Waste) Generation and Management. In Advances in
Solid and Hazardous Waste Management (pp. 249-266). Springer, Cham.
Johnson, N. E., Ianiuk, O., Cazap, D., Liu, L., Starobin, D., Dobler, G., & Ghandehari, M. (2017). Patterns
of waste generation: A gradient boosting model for short-term waste prediction in New York
City. Waste Management, 62, 3-11.
Wang, F., Huisman, J., Stevels, A., & Baldé, C. P. (2013). Enhancing e-waste estimates: Improving data
quality by multivariate Input–Output Analysis. Waste management, 33(11), 2397-2407.