Green Technology!

 

Green technology also demands the need for environmental justice. This means that electric vehicle batteries are sustainably manufactured, and rare earth materials recycled. This goes for other electronics as well. Instead of just dumping these e-wastes in open dumps and landfills, or worst still, exporting them to low-income countries especially in Africa and Asia, manufacturers of these products should ensure and develop guidelines and policies to jumpstart and regulate the recycle and reuse of these e-wastes.

According to the e-waste association of South Africa, the RSA alone generates about 6.2kgof e-waste per habitat annually and only 12% of these are recycled. Although, the UN has set aside October 14, every year, which was just a few days ago, for e-waste day to help address the issues and concerns regarding e-waste management, this current trend continues across boundary lines from high income and developed countries to underdeveloped and developing countries.

And now, what is e-waste?  E-waste is the waste derived from electrical and electronic equipment which are near end of life or completely dead! Instead of finding new ways to recycle and reuse these products again, they are often discarded and left to occupy spaces in workshops and home garages. Also, when the time comes for families, companies and organizations, and small business owners to discard these wastes, they are often times forgotten in these workshops to which they sent them for repairs and in turn when these workshops need to declutter their workspaces, they have no choice but to send them to the landfills and open dumps. What then happens to these wastes when they reach these landfills and open dumps? In Nigeria, statistics show that because there are no formal recycling plants presently working in the country, for adequate and safe management of these e-wastes, it is reported that about 500,000 tonnes of EEE(Electrical and Electronic Equipment) are often dumped in the open seas, workshops, primary water sources, bodies and landfills so that when rain falls on these wastes, toxins from these EEE are washed into the soil and are absorbed into the ground and surface waters which most of the time are taken up by plants, and these plants usually end up in human beings and animals!

There is the need for proper e-waste management, and this, however, cannot be overemphasized. First of all, for a smooth and easy transition to green technology, there must be a paradigm shift in the global technology space by making huge eco-friendly adjustments in technology innovation and production if we are going to gain back our land ecosystems by 2030 according to the UN Ecosystems Restoration Decade Act from 2021-2030. All facets of this present technology trends-mobile, android, IOS devices; AR, VR, Metaverse devices including our regular and updated electronics, hybrid and electric cars, must embark upon designing and developing eco-friendly, recyclable and reusable devices which will subsequently reduce the impact on the environment. We can't keep digging deep into the earth's core to extract metals in the relentless pursuit of the latest technology trends, updating versions of smart phones and pads, when the old version is still trying to find a demand for the supply of its market! I tell you; this is making huge demands and negative impacts on the land environment leaving it bereft and degraded! No one seems to notice or to even care at the alarming rate with which these rare earth materials are being extracted from beneath the earth's surface.

Secondly, governments of especially high-income nations should develop and implement policies which will address the problem of local, national and global e-waste management and recycling.  And finally, the import of e-wastes to low-income countries should be stopped and leaders of these nations shouldn't allow the import of such dangerous wastes into their countries!