As the high-tech industry continues to provide abundant amounts of electronics for consumers, legislatures face the question of how to deal with the economical and environmental costs of disposing the mounting amount of expired products.

Recent legislation throughout the nation has brought into focus the demand for proper disposal of electronic waste (e-waste), and according to SF State staff members, the campus is practicing responsible discarding of its e-waste.

Below the surface of Burk Hall is the “The SWAP Shop,” where electronic waste from throughout the campus is stored, analyzed and prepared for recycling or reuse. Property clerk Bill Henry runs the SWAP shop, an acronym for surplus with a purpose.

“It is not required to bring old electronics here,” Henry said. “But everyone here is pretty environmentally aware. The important part is this stuff is not getting shipped to China for some kid to smash up.”

Henry receives e-waste and other surplus, such as furniture, from all departments and figures out what can be reused throughout campus. The remaining unsalvageable equipment is picked up at no cost by JK Recycling, an East Bay recycling company. Henry said JK Recycling practices responsible dismantling and recycling of electronics.

More than 3,000 tons of electronics are discarded daily in the United States, and 50 million computers become obsolete every year, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

“There is becoming more electronics in the world,” said Robert Shearer, director of the environmental health and occupational safety office on campus. “Circuit boards, computer screens, etcetera, all have a small amount of mercury, which is among the chemicals we don’t put back into the environment. We make sure campus is doing what is required by law.”

SF State Procurement Director Steven Smith said before the SWAP Shop was made available to campus about seven years ago, the university did what everyone else was doing at the time, throwing its e-waste in the trash because it was considered just garbage.

“But as pictures came back from Asia with kids dismantling the computers and coming in contact with toxins, thoughts changed,” Smith said.

Today, 50 to 80 percent of the e-waste collected for recycling is still being exported to Asian countries that have no infrastructure to accommodate the hazardous properties of e-waste and no laws preventing its import, according to the Computer Take Back Campaign (CTBC), a national group of e-waste disposal advocates.

Delegates from 120 nations are scheduled to meet for five days, from Nov. 27 to Dec. 1, in Kenya to discuss the global e-waste situation and attempt to assign legislation on the growing predicament.

“Who pays for this is a big issue,” Sachiko Kuwabara Yamamoto, head of the Basel Convention which monitors hazardous waste, told a news conference Nov. 25.

This week’s meetings will decide on proposals to make manufacturers take more responsibility for their products, from the design phase through the supply chain to the ultimate disposal.

There is no national policy for safe recycling of e-waste. Any recycling is voluntary or state mandated.

California, Washington, Maine and Maryland are the only states that have passed e-waste recycling laws.

In September 2003, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed into law the Electronic Waste Recycling Act, the first legislation in the nation that requires producer responsibility and take-back of disregarded electronics from their customers. Other states are beginning to follow suit.

Illinois, Louisiana, and New Mexico have all passed legislation in this year requiring studies of the e-waste problem and recommendations for solutions, according to the CTBC.

Some say if manufacturers had to pay recycling costs, they would create less toxic and longer living products.

“Companies need to handle the products they make at the end of its lifecycle,” said SF State environmental studies major Bear Kaufmann. “This provides an incentive to design the product to be easier to recycle and reduce toxicity due to the cost of handling toxic waste.”

Fellow environmental studies major Mark Abraham, 21, agrees with Kaufmann that companies should design their products with the environment in mind.

“We should be demanding longer life spans for our machines in conjunction with better recycling methods,” Abraham said. “The rate of recycling in this country really needs to be taken a good look at, but at the same time we should remember that the recycle is only one of three R’s, so lets fight for more recycling and better ‘gas mileage’ for new e-machines.”