Recycling of electrical goods has become headline news in recent months as the UK consultation on the forthcoming EU Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) Directive hots up.

Producers, manufacturers and retailers are all gearing up with as much panic as gusto to be ‘WEEE compliant’ by August 2004 and consumer concerns are rising as reports surface from the the analyst group Gartner suggesting that it will be the consumer that will pick up the bill for additional costs.

Research carried out last year by Eric Williams of the United Nations University in Japan proved without a doubt that re-use is better for the environment than recycling. The majority of PCs routinely disposed of for recycling by businesses and consumers alike are actually far from their real ‘end-of-life’ and could go on to give as much as 6,000 additional hours of use.

This year alone will see two million working Pentium PCs buried in the British countryside as people embrace the latest technology on offer. Quite simply its 'consumerism' gone mad.

In stark contrast to this, in the developing world, 99 per cent of children leave school without ever having seen or touched a computer.  Even at university level education in Africa, access to PCs is severely restricted with 15,000 students typically having to share access to less than 80 computers.

So what should be done about it?

Changing Attitudes:

The WEEE Directive will go some way to encouraging (long overdue) a change in society’s attitude towards electrical waste. But bringing about such a significant change in behaviour will take a number years to be really beneficial.

Manufacturing responsibly:

In the quest for ‘WEEE compliance’, companies are being forced to look not only at how they design and source materials for products but also what will happen when they are no longer functional.  Assessing the environmental impact of a PC throughout its lifecycle.

Education and infrastructure:

Before the directive becomes legislation in the UK, there will have to be a comprehensive campaign to educate people about recycling electrical equipment to prevent them from continuing to just dump it in landfill. There will also have to be investment in recycling centres so they are geared up to deal with the equipment effectively when it’s brought in – currently there simply isn’t the infrastructure in the UK to deal with electrical take-back on the scale necessary.

Make a difference:

Computer Aid International is the world’s largest and most experienced supplier of professionally refurbished PCs for re-use in the developing world. Tony Roberts, the charity’s Chief Executive and Founder encourages people investigating PC disposal to consider the following:

1. What is the spec of the machine(s) – if it is a Pentium II, 233MHz, 2Gb hard disk and 64Mb RAM or higher spec it is more suitable for reuse than recycling.
2. does not mean that the machine has to be destroyed. Computer Aid International provides multiple overwrite data destruction on all hard drives to US Department of Defence standards securely rendering all data unrecoverable.
3. If you do want to donate equipment to the developing world, ensure that you do it through a professional organisation like Computer Aid that is working with people on the ground to provide essential technical support and training for incoming ICT hardware.
4. Be realistic - Many people still believe that their old PC should be worth more than the current market value. Sadly second hand PCs don’t fetch a premium. However if you are realistic and you don’t hang on to it for too long, your old equipment can make a vital contribution to the education of people who otherwise would remain forever trapped on the wrong side of the digital divide.