A New Life for Old Phones

  • Recellular employee Myron Woods tests phones to see if they can be resold or re-used. Here, he's got a Nokia 6019, the model reporter Shawn Allee dropped off for recycling. (Photo by Shawn Allee)

It’s pretty clear Americans like their cell phones. On average, we get a new one about every
eighteen months. And yet, we hold on to the old ones, too; the government estimates there’re
about one hundred million lying around in closets and drawers. Shawn Allee found people eager
to take your old phones – if only you’d recycle them:

Transcript

It’s pretty clear Americans like their cell phones. On average, we get a new one about every
eighteen months. And yet, we hold on to the old ones, too; the government estimates there’re
about one hundred million lying around in closets and drawers. Shawn Allee found people eager
to take your old phones – if only you’d recycle them:

I put an old phone in a recycling box a while ago.

I checked around and found it went to one of the nation’s largest phone refurbishers.
It’s a company called Recellular. And it’s based in an old auto parts plant in Dexter, Michigan.

“It’s a big open space with a lot of room to handle the 20,000 phones that come in every day.
You need a lot of benches, you need a lot of cubby holes.”

Vice President Mike Newman points to some incoming collection boxes.

“Every box is a mystery. You have no idea what’s in there until you open it up and start
sorting it out.”

Newman’s company is hunting for working phones to resell here or overseas. Before that, his
people sort and test every model of phone.

And workers like Myron Woods remove personal data.

“Contacts, the voice mails, the ringtones, text messages. Hit OK and the phone’s cleared
out. After that you make sure the phone calls out. You get a ringtone, you hear the
operator, and then you’re done.”

Newman: “In 2008 we processed almost 6 million phones and for 2009, we’re looking at
more than double-digit growth again.”

And of those six million phones, Mike Newman says he can sell about half of them. He’d do
better if people like me didn’t keep phones in drawers for so long.

“The longer you wait, the less value it has so, if you move down from that old phone, as
hard as it might be to part with it, it’s really important to recycle it as soon as possible – it
will do the most good.”

What about Newman’s other phones – the duds? He has a different company near Chicago
recycle them.

Allee: “And here they are … holy mackerel.”

I’m now at Simms Recycling Solutions. A conveyer belt is moving thousands of phones.

“There’s the end of the line for your cell phones.”

Mark Glavin is the VP of operations here. He says there’s gold, silver, and other metals in the
phones he gets from Recellular.

“The cell phones get shredded into somewhat uniform-sized pieces.”

Glavin sticks the pieces in an oven to burn off the plastic – and then grinds what’s left.

Glavin: “That’s what’s left of the cell phones.”

Allee: “It’s almost like the powder you use for a baby, except its black.”

Glavin: “Yes.”

Glavin says there’s gold and other metal in the powder – so metal companies will buy it.

He also has stubborn chunks of metal that won’t grind.

“Those get pulled off and then those go to the furnace room to be melted.”

Glavin: “This is appropriately named the furnace room, where all the melting goes on. It
gets nice and toasty in here in the winter time.”

Allee: “Wow, what are we seeing here?”

Glavin: “After the material has been melted, we’ll cast it into molds and into 30-40 pound
ingots.”

He’ll sell metal from these ingots along with that black powder.

Recellular and Glavin’s company recovers about 96 pounds of gold from its phones each year.

Plus, that gold’s worth more than a million dollars. And recycling saves energy, and prevents
pollution from gold mining.

Glavin says recycling is taking off, and he can always count on people wanting the latest and
greatest phones.

Glavin: “Pretty soon your cell phone will be a chip like, on an ear-ring and a watch, and
there’s nothing to it except for a very tiny electronic.”

Allee: “And people will still swap it for the next one.”

Glavin: “Without a doubt.”

For The Environment Report, I’m Shawn Allee.

Related Links

A Bloomin’ Solution for Cell Phone Waste?

  • Researcher Dr. Kerry Kirwan is experimenting with a cell phone case that will biodegrade. The case contains a flower seed. As the material breaks down, the seed is allowed to germinate and become a flower. (Photo courtesy of The University of Warwick)

Researchers in England have an idea for your old mobile
phones – bury them and grow a flower. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Erin Toner explains:

Transcript

Researchers in England have an idea for your old mobile phones – bury them and grow a
flower. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Erin Toner explains:


Most people have one – if not several – cell phones they’ve outgrown. Some keep them
around for no good reason, some just throw them away, and some people actually recycle
them.


Kerry Kirwan at the University of Warwick in England wants to take that idea further.
He’s developing a biodegradable cell phone case that could be buried and would grow
into a flower when you’re ready to upgrade your phone.


“We thought it’d be a rather unique way of getting people to take responsibility of the
disposal of their mobile phones, but also, a way for moving a lot of plastic waste from the
waste stream so it didn’t have to be dealt with.”


Kirwan says he’d like to have the product on the market in a few years. He says the
phone cases would contain a wide range of flower seeds, based on what would grow best
in your climate.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Erin Toner.

Related Links

Counterpoint: Agreements Will Invite More Diversions

  • The proposed Annex 2001 agreement is the subject of lively debate as to whether it will help or hinder the conservation of the Great Lakes (Photo by Jeremy Lounds)

Officials from the eight states and two provinces in the region have proposed two agreements that would regulate the use of Great Lakes water. They’re known as the Annex 2001 Implementing Agreements. Response to the proposed agreements has generally been positive. But for some in the region, they’re seen as a slippery slope. Great Lakes Radio Consortium commentator Suzanne Elston is worried that the proposed agreements will lead to unlimited diversions in the future:

Transcript

Officials from the eight states and two provinces in the region have proposed two agreements
that would regulate the use of Great Lakes water. They’re known as the Annex 2001 Implementing
Agreements. Response to the proposed agreements has generally been positive. But for some in
the region, they’re seen as a slippery slope. Great Lakes Radio Consortium commentator Suzanne
Elston is worried that the proposed agreements will lead to unlimited diversions in the future:


In theory, the proposed Agreements are supposed to provide a framework for using the water of the
Great Lakes. In reality, they’re about as leaky as a sunken lake freighter. The framework’s
there, but they fail to impose an overall limit on the volume of water that can be diverted,
or who can take it.


Not only that, but proposals to take less than a million gallons per day out of the basin won’t
require a region-wide review, several of these smaller withdrawals could eventually add up to a
whole lot of water. And whether it’s one large pipe or a lot of tiny ones, the end result is the
same.


Given that the Great Lakes basin contains 20% of all the fresh water on the planet, diverting
some of it shouldn’t be a problem. Unfortunately, only 1% of that water is renewed each year.
It would be a good idea to first figure out how much water can be taken without disrupting the
ecological balance of the Lakes. Only once that’s been done should we be looking at allowing
large-scale withdrawals.


And then there’s the threat of trade challenges. Each state or province that approves a water
taking permit won’t be paid directly for the water. Instead they’ll recieve a funding to upgrade
sewage treatment plants or to improve local habitats for example. Recently, a Canadian non-profit
asked for legal opinion about the Agreements. The response was that linking the approval process
to funding for public works basically means that the water is being sold, and under the terms of
NAFTA, once you’ve identified something as a commodity, you can’t restrict its sale.


Canadians should be particularly concerned about these Agreements. The Council of Great Lakes
Governors drafted them. And although the premiers of Ontario and Quebec have signed off on them,
in the end, neither province has the right to veto the decisions made by the Council. In my book,
that’s a lot like being invited to dinner and then being asked to leave before the main course.
And the reverse is true too. If Ontario or Quebec approves a withdrawal, states in the U.S.
wouldn’t have the ability to veto the decision. We share these lakes. If we are all called on
to protect the Great Lakes, then we all need to have an equal voice. That’s why our federal
representatives in Washington D.C. and Ottawa need to draw up a binding international agreement
on water withdrawals.


If nothing else, the proposed Agreements have made it clear that the Great Lakes must be
protected. And with 40 million users already relying on this irreplaceable resource, we clearly
need something better than these Agreements currently have to offer.


Host Tag: Suzanne Elston is a syndicated columnist living in Courtice, Ontario.

Related Links

Off-Road Diesels to Clean Up

The Environmental Protection Agency says a new rule will cut down on pollution from stationary diesel engines. It applies to industrial equipment like backhoes and forklifts, and to farm tractors. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Stephanie Hemphill reports:

Transcript

The Environmental Protection Agency says a new rule will cut down on pollution from
stationary diesel engines. It applies to industrial equipment like backhoes and forklifts,
and to farm tractors. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Stephanie Hemphill reports:


The EPA says the measure will prevent up to 12,000 premature deaths, a million lost
work days, and 15,000 heart attacks every year.


The new rule aims to do two things: clean up diesel fuel, and clean the exhaust from
diesel engines. Doug Aburano is with the EPA.


“The engine manufacturers have agreed to produce a catalyst that would reduce
emissions from these engines, while we also have an agreement from the diesel producers
to reduce the sulfur content to such an extent that the sulfur would not poison the
catalysts that the engine manufacturers are doing. So you have to do a collaborative
approach like that to get to the huge reductions we’re looking at.”


Aburano says emissions of soot and smog will be cut by 90%. It will take several years
to accomplish that, as businesses and farms replace old equipment. Health and
environmental organizations are welcoming the measure.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Stephanie Hemphill.

Related Links

Obsolete Computers Piling Up

The growth of computer technology makes our lives easier in
many ways. But there’s one big drawback: as the technology improves,
you have to update your system frequently. Now some environmentalists
are becoming concerned about the pollution caused by discarded
computers. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Wendy Nelson reports: