City to collect e-waste at collection event

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Published on Thursday, 26 July 2012 15:11

ELECTRONICS MAKE UP MAJORITY OF TOXIC WASTE

Mary Loveland
Daily Elk Citian 

Each year, the United States dumps between 300 and 400 million electronic items. Less than 20 percent of those items are recycled, which means the other 80 percent is disposed of in landfills or is collecting dust in the owner's home.

To help solve this problem, Elk City has scheduled a quarterly E-Cycling Collections event to provide residents with a proper means of disposing items like televisions and computers. The second of four of these events this year will take place tomorrow.

"You're saving the expensive real estate, which is the landfill," Larry Hart, Elk City operations supervisor, said. "You're preserving it for longer years. And, there's a lot of toxicity in electronics that we're keeping out of the field, keeping out of your waste stream and keeping out of your wells and all of that."

E-waste makes up two percent of America's landfills, but equals 70 percent of the overall toxic waste, according to Greenpeace – an independent, international organization that focuses on the Earth's "fragile" environment.

The e-cycling event, which will be held at the Department of Corrections from 9 a.m. until 2 p.m., will accept the following items: personal computers, laptops and notebooks, CRT monitors, flat screen monitors, keyboards and mice, printers and copiers, toner and ink cartridges, fax machines, peripherals and gadgets, power supplies and chargers, batteries and UPS systems, cables and wires, networking equipment, servers and racks, fitness equipment, kitchen appliances, other appliances of all sizes, microwaves, glass tube televisions, gaming equipment, CDs and video tapes, digital cameras, cell phones and PDAs, small electronic devices, multi-media equipment, batteries, auto batteries, and hard drive wipe with certification.

All of these items will be accepted free of charge. However, they will not accept large appliances like washers, etc.

For the full story, pick up the Thursday, July 26, edition of the Daily Elk Citian.