Journal of High Institute of Public Health (Sep 2007)
Assessment of the Current Practices of e-Waste Management in Alexandria, Egypt (Case Study: Waste from Personal Computers)
Abstract
ewaste is one of the fastest growing waste streams in the world. Decision- and policy-makers in Egypt have not yet tackled the issue of e-waste management. Recently, this management has been recognized as a serious issue due to numerous environmental concerns such as a) e-waste quantity generated at an alarming rate, b) pollution of air and groundwater, c) resource consumption, d) health and environmental hazards associated with informal e-waste recycling, and e) illegal trans-boundary movement of this e-waste. This study was carried out in Alexandria aiming at assessing the current practices adopted in the management of one type of e-waste, that is waste resulting from obsolete personal computers (PC-waste). To achieve this aim, information was collected from 40 PC-waste stakeholders. Furthermore, Toxicity Characteristic Leaching Procedure (TCLP) was performed on 10 discarded Printed Wire Boards (PWBs) to determine whether they should be considered as hazardous waste or not. Results of the study revealed that 55% of PC-waste were reused especially in PC repairing and refurbishing centers, that the major means of disposing PC-waste was by selling it to scrap dealers (50% of the respondents), followed by throwing it with municipal solid waste (MSW) (35% of the respondents), and finally by applying a "Producer Take-Back" system especially for large e-waste generators (15% of the respondents). PC-waste was collected by scrap dealers using trucks or donkey carts. Informal recycling was taking place to reclaim steel, plastic and aluminum. Fortunately, no intense material recovery from PC-waste was encountered in Alexandria. All the remaining fractions from PC-waste were found to be thrown with MSW to be directed to the landfill. As for the PWBs, they were found to exhibit toxicity due to high lead levels and therefore, they should be considered hazardous waste D008. Finally, the study concluded the complete absence of any legislation or infra-structure to deal with e-waste management and recommended a framework for an action plan to be taken by policy-makers in Egypt.
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