Page 26 - Sonoma County Gazette - January 2018

Stewarding the Electronic Dinosaur
Electronic waste has become the fastest growing waste stream in the WORLD.
When discarded, the toxicity of electron- ic waste functions as an eroding agent on clean water, healthy soil, and fresh air. The impacts of improperly disposed e-waste are measurable, harmful, and applicable on a global scale. The general cause and consequence of its mismanagement seem to be shared equally among manufacturers and consumers alike. One cause being the fact that most electronic devices experi- ence a life cycle that overturns as rapid as advancing technology will allow it to be. Another cause is the fact that these devices can be inconvenient to dispose of properly
Bottom Line:
due to limited drop-o locations and/or expensive disposal fees. The conse- quence is a growing stockpile of obsoletes that can leach toxic discharges into places like our drinking water supply.
Santa Rosa’s garbage hauler. As goes Santa Rosa so goes the rest of the county. Curbside residential rates are expected to increase by 58%. If you’re paying $16.97 a month now, expect it to rise to $26.85. Commercial rates will increase by an even greater percentage. Yet, these new rates are still 7% - 18% below industry standards for similar size communities in Northern California. One reason these rates seem so high is because Ratto was charging 42% - 48% below the average rate. They were able to achieve this, in part, by paying drivers an average of $16 an hour while line recyclers received barely more than the state minimum wage of $10.50 an hour.
The cradleto-grave stewardship of our electronic dinosaurs is disappointing.
How you can help:
• Hold on to electronics longer to reduce demand.
• Donate items that can be refurbished or reused, otherwise recycle.
• Form an outreach campaign and/or organization to increase awareness in
Ratto’s below average rates bought us below average service and a dismal environmental record. The deal was a 45% diversion rate. A diversion rate is the percentage of trash kept out of our landfill through recycling, composting and repurposing. What we got was a 36% diversion rate. The Standish Avenue Recycling Center was closed by the health department. Ratto’s trucks polluted heavily and frequently broke down which led to poor customer service. A 2015 lawsuit shut down Sonoma Compost and we’ve been out-sourcing compost ever since. Up until recently, Ratto employees lacked union protections resulting
in few wage increases, dangerous working conditions (garbage and recycling workers are in the 5th most dangerous profession in America), extended work hours and unsafe trucks. What you pay for is what you get.
your neighborhood.
The rate at which technology refreshes has become so advanced that many
consumer electronics sold in the US are rendered outdated within a year. An- nual sales in the US are over 200 billion dollars and growing. As one would reasonably correlate, the annual production of e-waste is growing in near mag- nitude. Cradle stages are brief, characterized by a consumer electronics industry spending nearly 4 billion dollars a year in advertising. By repeatedly solicit-
ing to us the concept that newer is necessary, we have become conditioned to anticipate the release date of the model 5001 while the model 5000 in our pocket is still under warranty. Overnight our gadgets become a dinosaur; functionally extinct and thrust into the grave stage.
Recology is a union shop and has been since the 1930’s. Their diversion rate for San Francisco is 80%. In LA they’re shooting for 90% by 2025. The goal in Santa Rosa is 60% by 2029. They plan on introducing a new fleet of trucks and containers. They will expand services, upgrade the Standish Avenue site, and try to bring composting back to Sonoma County. Until that happens, Recology’s six composting facilities will absorb our compost. Critical to their success is eco-education. Zero waste specialists will help customers, both commercial and residential, improve their recycling and composting while reducing their trash. For us to reach zero waste, customer buy-in is needed. Consider what
a 1°C climate change has brought us to date: unprecedented hurricanes, mass migrations, droughts and, of course, fires. It looks like October’s fires weren’t started by climate change, but climate change most certainly exacerbated them. Proper waste disposal is one way we can reduce the effects of climate change.
Disappointingly, the grave stage is even more brief. As it stands today, our electronic relics are seldom tossed away with the ecological dignity that recy- cling or reusing would provide. According to the Environmental Protection Agency, nearly 3 BILLION tons of electronics are disposed of each year, and only 25 percent are recycled. The vast remaining become deposited into land- lls where they begin to leach into the water, soil, and air. Any hazardous quali- ties contained within them such as arsenic, chromium, lead, and mercury are unrestricted in their travels. Roughly half of the states in the US have enacted e-waste legislation, and the options available for proper disposal are improving but are still very limited and oftentimes expensive. In most places, batteries and cell phones can be taken back at no charge to their place of purchase. Free take- back events and curbside pick-ups are available at certain times of the year.
So what’s your bottom line? Is it money or the continuity of life on this planet?
Sources: Made Local, September/October 2017 issue, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Press Democrat 8/16/17, 8/29/17, Sonoma County Gazette 8/29/17.
Occupy Sonoma County embraces the egalitarian, deep democracy principles of the Occupy Movement with a regional strategy for effectively organizing county-wide social justice campaigns that are globally relevant. For more information contact OccupySonomaCounty.org or call 707-877-6650.
If you suspect that what you’re about to throw into the trash may contain an electronic component, just set it aside for a moment. Contact your City or trash service provider for guidance. Look online for drop-o locations (www.calre- cycle.ca.gov/Electronics/Collection or Call2recycle.org) and special take-back events in your area. The moment that we de ne our electronic device to be electronic waste, is the same moment we become stewards of our vitality.
It Costs More If We Don’t Recycle
By Occupy Sonoma County
What’s your bottom line? Is it money or the continuity of life on this planet? In January 2018, Recology of San Francisco will replace The Ratto Group as
This article was authored by Nick Bennett, of the City of Rohnert Park, on behalf of RRWA. RRWA (www.rrwatershed.org) is an association of local public agencies in the Russian River Wa- tershed that have come together to coordinate regional programs for clean water, habitat restora- tion, and watershed enhancement.
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