Get gold from your phone!
A new action launched by the UN Environment Programme’s GreenUp! initiative aims to increase metal recycling rates by encouraging Europeans to take their old mobile phones to recycling stations.
Europe: In today’s fast-paced world, it’s hard to imagine life without a mobile phone. Now the Green Up! campaign from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) is encouraging people across Europe to use their old mobile phones to promote sustainable development.
- Many of these metals are crucial to clean technologies
Recent UNEP studies have shown that the failure to recycle many metals – many of which are present in mobile phones - not only causes wasted resources and environmental damage; it threatens shortages of elements essential to modern technologies.
UNEP’s latest Resource Panel report Recycling Rates of Metals: A Status Report, stated that less than one-third of some 60 metals have an end-of-life recycling rate above 50 per cent, and that 34 elements have a recycling rate below 1 per cent.
Many of these metals are crucial to clean technologies, such as batteries for hybrid cars or magnets in wind turbines. Some of the metals found in mobile phones like gold, silver and tantalum are precious; while others like cadmium and lead are toxic. Recovering these metals lessens the demand for mining new ore and helps protect sensitive natural habitats and communities from the pollution that often results from mining or improper disposal.
The UNEP report says that “in spite of significant efforts in a number of countries and regions, many metal recycling rates are discouragingly low, and a 'recycling society' appears no more than a distant hope.”
Throughout December, GreenUp! is encouraging Europeans to make this distant hope a reality by taking their old mobile phones for recycling.
GreenUp’s website pinpoints recycling centres on a Google map, which we hope that - with your help – can become a comprehensive map of all European mobile phone recycling centres: www.unep.org/greenup.
This latest ‘action’ from the Green Up! campaign draws attention to the Waste sector of UNEP’s Green Economy report, which outlines pathways for a transition towards low carbon, resource efficient sustainable development. The final version of the UNEP Green Economy Report was launched earlier this month.
