Big Tech is Becoming an Ally in the Fight Against Climate Change!

What electronics do you use every day in your home? Cell phone and laptop, sure, but think deeper. There’s the microwave, your fridge, definitely a coffee maker. Leaving the kitchen, there’s the television, air conditioner, washer and dryer, maybe you’re an avid crafter with a sewing machine, or you have kids and therefore a slew of gaming consoles. Take a moment right now and think through, room by room. All those electronics really start to add up! But what impact does that army of technology have on the environment while it’s in your home, and what happens to all of those electronics when it’s time for an upgrade?

The dishwasher that stopped working, the cell phone that became outdated, or the Christmas lights on which half the strand gave up. These electronics–and there are lots of them–eventually become trash, just like everything else. Could there be a better way, though, for the next generation of gizmos and gadgets that enter your life?

Next time one of those appliances goes down, the decision of what to do next doesn’t have to be quite as fraught with environmental worry. It’s becoming easier and easier to make a choice for your next dishwasher or fridge that is way better for the planet, thanks to some of the world’s big appliance companies who are taking a more critical look at the impact of our electronics from creation to end of life.

Thanks to a growing movement from consumers to ask for better from big companies, there’s a new wave of doing business that you can help move in a more positive direction.

The fight for our planet is a daunting one, and in a world where just 100 companies are responsible for 71% of global emissions ¹, this fight requires not only individual action but massive action in the form of companies doing their part. 

Big businesses have had a long history of not caring about what happens to their products as soon as they leave the store. But now one of the biggest electronics retailers in the US, Best Buy, is deciding that can’t be the case any longer. With requirements set out by Energy Star–a partnership between the EPA and Department of Energy–the electronics and appliance giant is working to make our electronics use less electricity, cut use of greenhouse gasses, and reduce energy costs ², all of which are a benefit to our world.

Not only are they spearheading efforts to have appliances run more sustainably in your home, Best Buy also recycles, reuses, and repurposes e-waste (electronic waste) and appliances. Since 2009, they have taken back 2 billion pounds of electronics since 2009 and recycled them  through Electronic Recyclers International. The electronics they haul away are broken down into materials that are then repurposed for use in a myriad of new products from fiber optic cables to airplanes ³.

And it’s not just Best Buy joining the fight for our world. Giants like Home Depot, Staples, Apple, and more are developing sustainability programs for when their products are no longer usable.  

“When we started putting pen to paper and saw the carbon impact of the use of products that we sell, it was 40 times that of our own operation. So that’s where we set out to say: if you’re plugging in at home, that has to be part of our goals to reduce it.”

– Tim Dunn

To learn more about this initiative, here’s Tim Dunn, Director of Environmental Affairs at Best Buy, in a great video courtesy of TED.

Thank you to TED for bringing us this great feature. It’s amazing what happens in the world when businesses start to care.

Just like your click is a vote on the internet for what you want to see more of, every dollar you spend tells a business that what they’re doing is working, or it isn’t. Vote with your purchases and buy from businesses who are making a difference for you, your friends, your neighbors, and generations to come. 

Companies like Best Buy and Energy Star are making great strides for the environment while their products are in use. But what can we do with the products we have that aren’t designed for this level of sustainability when they reach their end of life?

It’s absolutely fantastic that big business has entered the ring in the fight for more sustainable appliances, but that doesn’t mean we can completely drop the ball on how we get rid of the ones that already exist. 

In 2014, 41.8 million tons of domestic appliances at the end of their life were dumped, with less than a sixth properly recycled ⁵. And in 2019, only 17.4% of e-waste produced made it to a recycling facility or center where it could be properly disassembled and disposed of for precious metals to be reused. The remaining 82.6% was “illegally dumped, overwhelmingly in low or middle-income countries, where it is recycled by informal workers ⁶. 

We all know there are chemicals in our electronics that might not sit too well in a landfill for the next few centuries, but what many don’t realize is that human health is significantly impacted, too. In fact, the current informal processing of e-waste jeopardizes the health of millions of children, adolescents, and expectant mothers (more than 20.9 million people, combined) who work in or live near e-waste recycling facilities in their current form, leading to intellectual disabilities, less developed organs, abnormal growth rates, changes in lung function, cancer, and much more ⁷. This comes not only in the form of fumes from burning e-waste, but also because of food contamination in areas where this waste is taken. 

On the flipside of that coin, the 17.4% of e-waste that was disposed of properly prevented as much as 15 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalents from being released into the environment ⁸, protecting habitats, the ozone layer, agriculture, and even human health ⁹. 

If your two options are endangering human life or protecting ecosystems, doesn’t the latter sound a whole lot better?

While ultimately, this is the burden of big companies and corporations to do and be better for people and the planet (and governments and legislatures to regulate them), that’s not to say individual actions don’t matter. They do. If we can make that big of a difference just by the place we choose to bring our old electronics to, that’s absolutely worth doing.

To read all about how you can responsibly dispose of your bigger appliances like washers and dryers, check out Green Citizen’s article here. And to learn about how you can sustainably dispose of other technological waste such as old phones or laptops, take a look at this article from Yale Sustainability. 

The gratitude economy is all around us! 

This can seem overwhelming, but don’t fret. The “gratitude economy” is here, and growing all around us. More and more of us are making consumer choices based on the reputation companies have for making the world a better place; the way they give back, their ethical practices, or other social responsibility. And when businesses notice that so many of us are purchasing with this in mind, they are driven to build charity, ethical practices, and good deeds into their work. This creates a feedback loop that’s pretty hard to beat.

For a few fantastic examples of this happening in massive businesses in every field, check out this article next: 

To hear more about businesses that are changing our world for the better and what is sparking these incredible changes, check out this episode of the Conspiracy of Goodness Podcast, too:

There’s a long way to go when it comes to recycling all of the many, many electronics on the planet (think back to how many are in your own house!), but this makes it clear that thanks to people who vote with their purchases, the needle has begun to move on big businesses truly making the world a better place. By thinking critically about the appliances and electronics you buy, where you buy from, and where you bring them when they’re done, you can be a part of moving the needle even more.

• Ellen

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