A YEAR-LONG UN-funded study by Basel Action Network (BAN) that used GPS trackers hidden inside of 35 old computers, printers and monitors has revealed that two of the devices left at the consumer take-back desk at Officeworks were exported to Asia in likely contravention of international law
A YEAR-LONG UN-funded study by Basel Action Network (BAN) that used GPS trackers hidden inside of 35 old computers, printers and monitors has revealed that two of the devices left at the consumer take-back desk at Officeworks were exported to Asia in likely contravention of international law. The BAN study entitled 'Illegal Export of e-Waste from Australia: a story as told by GPS trackers' described how BAN, mimicking the actions of Australian consumers, delivered the used computing equipment to official government-sanctioned consumer drop-off locations in Adelaide, Brisbane, Perth and Sydney and then monitored the signals sent by the devices over the course of a year.
Most of the equipment ended up in the hands of recyclers or was dumped into landfills and stopped signaling. But two LCD monitors containing toxic mercury back-lights that were handed over to a pair of Officeworks stores in Brisbane presumably for domestic recycling were exported first to Hong Kong with one moving onward to Thailand.
According to BAN, the export of toxic waste of any kind should be strictly controlled under the terms of the Basel Convention to which Australia is a party. China, including Hong Kong, is also a Basel Party and has strictly forbidden the import of any waste device containing mercury.
'These exports should never have happened,' said BAN director Jim Puckett. 'It stands to reason that this discovery represents far more volume than simply two devices..'
BAN followed the GPS signals to Hong Kong and on to Thailand. The site in Hong Kong had been cleaned out and was likely just a temporary staging area. But in Thailand they found a large 'dioxin factory' where e-waste was first broken apart and then the removed circuit boards were processed en masse with crude chemical and smelting techniques in an effort to extract the gold and copper.
