Disposing of old technology is a difficult process in UAE

Improper recycling or disposal could harm environment and raise security threat.

DUBAI // The disposal of computers and mobile phones in a safe manner is not as easy as one might think.

Dumping electronic equipment in landfills allows potentially hazardous materials to pollute the environment, and pose concerns about personal security and privacy.

The high purchasing power of UAE residents and the constant introduction of new electronic gadgets result in high volumes of disposed phones, tablets, televisions and other devices that need to be handled appropriately, according to Kenneth Neil, an electronics recycling professional in the UAE.

“Everyone I speak to seems to be starting a personal museum at home,” he said. “They have all of this retired equipment that they just have no outlet for.”

For their part, companies often discard electronic devices by auctioning them to the highest bidder. But that did not necessarily mean that the devices would be handled in the best possible manner, said Mr Neil.

The equipment can be resold, dismantled and sent for further processing. Electronic components contain valuable metals such as gold, copper and lead.

The problem is that the valuable metals are found in such small amounts that “you need massive volumes and great separation processes” to retrieve and process a sufficient quantity to make a profit, said Mr Neil.

In the relatively small country of the UAE, “the volumes and the infrastructure make it difficult” for the private sector to profit from recycling, he said.

When electronic gadgets are dismantled, components such as motherboards are sent abroad and could end up in countries with low environmental standards. “That is the question, once it [the equipment] leaves your facility, you lose all control with what people can do with it,” said Mr Neil.

“Is it going to landfill somewhere else? Is it being sent to villages in the developing world where they are using child labour to take the items apart? Are they setting fire to the batteries or the cables to lose the low-value parts of the item they have to just retain the lead or the copper?

“There is no point doing good recycling with the metal and plastic here in the UAE if you are sending the motherboard to a country where it is being dipped in acid by a 12-year-old child.”

UAE authorities need to introduce more regulations to ensure the proper handling of electronic waste, said Mr Neil.

“This is something that the Government really ought to be driving, and producing certificates for people that legitimise their business, so that we do not need to ask those questions,” he said.

“It should be a given that if you say you are recycling, you get audited properly by the municipality and the Ministry of Environment. Whoever is doing a take-back programme or a recycler, they need to have auditable programmes.”

Data security also needs to be looked at more seriously, Presently, most companies have policies to format the hard disk of computers or laptops that they are auctioning.

But the practice does not guarantee that the data stored in the devices could not be retrieved.

“The best analogy for that is you use a reference book and you tear out the index. All you are doing is taking away the ability to find the information,” he said. “It is not good enough, there needs to be more done with it.”

No one from the Government was available for comment.