Throughout the years, humanity has faced many problems and challenges. It began with the first human wanting to lift things up and to travel to other places. People started to use their mind to create things and to build machines. As life went on, they surely solved some problems, but created more complex ones! No one can deny the benefits of the new industrial and technological advances; it not only enabled us to obtain gold and other metals from deep in the ground, but also to fly high in the sky. All of this ingenuity, however, comes with certain drawbacks that need to be fixed or improved upon. One drawback in particular is the disposal of ‘industrial waste.’ In this paper, we will be tackling two of the most important sources of industrial waste: E-waste and mining waste.
E-Waste
With the development of technology in our everyday life, people tend to own more novel and advanced electronic appliances, discarding the old ones. It is estimated that each year the discarded electronics worldwide weigh about 50 million metric tons; over 9.4 million tons of them are generated in the U.S. (2012). [1] According to the United Nations …show more content…
[2] They contain many hazardous, if not radioactive, materials such as: Mercury (found in batteries), lead, chromium, barium, and other heavy metals (found in cathode ray tubes in TVs and monitors) which cause renal toxicity and in some cases mental retardation. On the other hand, cell phones contain large amounts of gold and silver; it is estimated that America ditches about $60 million worth of gold in silver per year. The problem is that most of the electronic materials are non-degradable which means that they will take millions of years to dissolve in the soil. The governments have been trying to solve the problem of E-waste accumulation either by burying, burning, or
E-Waste
With the development of technology in our everyday life, people tend to own more novel and advanced electronic appliances, discarding the old ones. It is estimated that each year the discarded electronics worldwide weigh about 50 million metric tons; over 9.4 million tons of them are generated in the U.S. (2012). [1] According to the United Nations …show more content…
[2] They contain many hazardous, if not radioactive, materials such as: Mercury (found in batteries), lead, chromium, barium, and other heavy metals (found in cathode ray tubes in TVs and monitors) which cause renal toxicity and in some cases mental retardation. On the other hand, cell phones contain large amounts of gold and silver; it is estimated that America ditches about $60 million worth of gold in silver per year. The problem is that most of the electronic materials are non-degradable which means that they will take millions of years to dissolve in the soil. The governments have been trying to solve the problem of E-waste accumulation either by burying, burning, or