Last year Americans disposed of more than 20 million TVs, which represents a lost opportunity to conserve natural resources such as copper and iron.
You might say it’s just a little copper, so what?
We live in Green Valley, home of the one of the largest open pit copper mines in the world. The tailing piles are so high we can’t see the mountains on the other side of the valley. In fact, my husband initially thought the tailing piles were mountains. Aside from the vast acres required for an open pit mine, metal mining is the largest single consumer of groundwater in the area. Green Valley area does not have a sustainable water supply given current groundwater pumping rates in the Upper Santa Cruz River Basin. In addition, local citizens have had to battle the mining companies regarding water, soil and air pollution.
The raw materials for your new TV may not come from your backyard but they come from someone’s backyard. The world does not have an unlimited supply of any resource. And the more scarce a resource becomes, the more we have to dig, refine, smelt and pollute to get at it.
So when the EPA announced that Wilmington, N.C., is the first city in the nation to switch to digital-only broadcasting I cringe a bit. Yes, Wilmington residents and the rest of the country who own an analog TV set and who receive free broadcasts (via rabbit ears or a roof-top antenna) can extend the life of their TV by connecting it to a digital converter box. And yes, Energy Star-qualified digital converter boxes are available for purchase. And yes, consumers who choose to buy a new TV, can purchase Energy Star-qualified sets.
To me it’s just not enough to buy Energy Star to reduce the amount of electricity you use. Reduce your environmental impact by recycling your old TV. This way valuable materials from the circuit boards, metal wiring, leaded glass, and plastics can be recovered. Those raw materials come from someplace where people live, work and play. It’s easy to forget about it when the mine is “over there”. It really sinks home when it’s in your own backyard.
Contact your local household hazardous waste collection and recycling program to find out whether they will be sponsoring an upcoming recycling event. For suggestions on recycling, check out the EPA’s webpage Where can I recycle my TV?
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Welcome to Verda Vivo. My name is Daryl Warner Laux.
In France we have the same phenomenon with a lot of households switching from old tv screens to LCDs.
Luckily for us, each and every appliance is disposed of in special places where they are collected and recycled…
(Yeah, I am in Nancy, it’s going fine and I connected myself to read you… Keep it up Daryl !
)
Edouard, That certainly seems to be a better way to keep TVs and the like out of the trash!
I’m glad to hear you’re in Nancy. I hope all is well and you have settled in nicely. And thank you for connecting and reading my post! I look forward to reading your comments! ~ Daryl
I am a bit baffled at the way that people in our society think throwing out everything you do have in order to buy more efficient, stainless steel versions are the answer. Different things have to be weighed out, and I’m here in NC, where everyone I know went out and bought themselves a new TV instead of the converter box… and left their old TV by the dumpster…
Ashley Sue, It really hit home living in the vicinity of a copper mine. I wonder if one day we’ll mine our landfills for raw materials. ~ Daryl
It will come one day I guess, cf my article on why recycling has a bright future :
http://www.elrst.com/2008/08/20/why-recycling-has-a-really-bright-future/
Yikes! 20 million? That’s terrible. We’ve had the one in the living room for ages. Since I was a little girl. The one in my room is not nearly as old, but I’ve had it for awhile. Admittedly, we have gotten rid of some in my lifetime, though.
Your story touched me because not only do I care about the environment, but also, I live in the Appalachian mountains were coal mining is an issue, and clean water is a luxury for some. We also have air pollution near MTR sites, and the soil on MTR sites is not nearly as healthy as it once was. Little will grow on such land. Some people within my own county have to buy bottled water or bathe at other people’s homes because their own water is so polluted. I am using city water, but even that worries me. I guess at least mine doesn’t look brown, black, orange or greasy like some people’s here.
“The raw materials for your new TV may not come from your backyard but they come from someone’s backyard.”<- BEAUTIFUL statement and it hit home, too. People don’t realize where their electricity comes from, either. A lot of it comes from MTR sites. It doesn’t have to, but it does. And this is affecting our homeland here, and it’s affecting people’s lives and their health, and their property. I don’t mean to hijack your post, but it just….I just feel a connection between the two issues. Thanks for posting this and for the link. If we have to get rid of our t.v.’s later, I will try to see if we can have them recycled and encourage others to do the same.
hillbillymermaid, Oh how right you are. I took the time to read about MTR on STOP Mountaintop Removal Coal Mining – http://endmtr.com/. It’s so easy to forget about where your energy, food, copper or whatever comes from unless you experience it for yourself and then you realize the cost, both to the environment and to our collective health. A quote from their website: “If you put a windmill up and you don’t like it you can always take it back down. If you take down a mountain, you can never put it back up.” ~ Daryl
Edouard, Great post on recycling. Yes to mining landfills! ~ Daryl
We will come to that… unless we want to live in the same world than Wall E.
keep up the good work Daryl !
Hello again! Thank you so much for taking the time to look into mtr. It’s truly terrible. I live in the second most bio-diverse region on earth, and they are blowing it up. I bookmarked the EPA page that told where to recycle our t.v.’s in case I need the info. later down the road and if I hear anyone talk about getting a new t.v., I’ll tell them. Good luck in your struggle!
hillbillymermaid, After researching mountaintop removal coal mining, I had to write a post about it – http://verdavivo.wordpress.com/2008/09/22/mountaintop-removal-coal-mining/. I am stunned that such a practice is permitted. And for what? ~ Daryl