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ELECTRONIC WASTE IS BECOMING A GROWING ISSUE GREGG CHAMBERLAIN gregg.chamberlain@eap.on.ca
Recycle Action staff package up old electronics and batteries for shipment to Shift Recycling in Brampton, which has the proper facilities and trained personnel to disassemble these items, and salvage the valuable materials for sale to metal market dealers. Old styrofoam Got a new flat-screen T.V. or a new com- puter monitor? Wonder what to do with the Styrofoam packaging that protected it inside the box? Recycle Action has a Styrofoam recycling program to deal with the problem. The only restriction is that the agency can only take white Styrofoam for recycling. Black and coloured Styrofoam, which some outfits may use for packaging or producing “dispos- able” food trays, is not recyclable yet. “It helps create jobs for two days a week for our people,” said Lessard. “My (used) plastics buyers buy all the recycled Styro- foam we can produce.” A special machine takes the old Styro- foam, sucks the air of it, then shreds, com- presses, and transforms the leftover material into pure plastic. Last year Recycle Action diverted 11 tons of Styrofoam from the landfill and helped many local businesses save on their own garbage disposal bills. “I would say 90 per cent of my Styrofoam comes from furniture stores,” Lessard said. “One guy told me that he saves on the cost of at least one dumpster load a month. That’s $300 less on his dumpster rental bill.”
One unexpected result of the Information Age is the increased amount of electro- nic waste that may show up at local landfills. Burnt-out computer monitors, defunct transistor radios, obsolete cell- phones, even used coffee makers that can’t perk anymore, they can all take up unnecessary space at the landfill. Unless there is an e-waste recycling program in place like the one that Recycle Action operates at its Spence Street head- quarters in Hawkesbury. Recycle Action has offered e-waste recycling since 2008 and Robert Lessard, director of operations, noted that the electronic waste business is doing “very good” for the non-profit group and its employees. “I have more items coming in every year,” Lessard said. “It’s everything from audio speakers to old T.V.s. We even help recycle toner ink cartridges. And cellphone batteries, any kind of dry cell battery, we can take those too. But not car or truck batteries.” Old electronics contain minute amounts of valuable metals like gold, silver, or plati- num as part of their wiring or circuit board components. Old batteries, like those for cellphones, contain small amounts of nickel, cadmium, lithium, and/or zinc, which can be recycled to make new batteries or used in other things.
Robert Lessard de Recycle-Action présente des exemples du « bon » et du « mauvais » type de polystyrène expansé. Le polystyrène expansé blanc peut être transformé en plastique réutilisable grâce au système de recyclage de polystyrène expansé de Recycle-Action, mais le polystyrène expansé noir et coloré ne le peut pas. —photo Gregg Chamberlain
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