e-waste – an underestimated environmental problem
Every day a vast number of electric and electronic devices end up as waste; some of them ready for scrap, others just obsolete. All this is gradually mounting up to a serious environmental problem, which has so far failed to attract the public interest.
There was a need for analysis and dialogue from a neutral standpoint in order to find solutions which reduce environmental risk and enhance development. This is why we have started developing StEP in late 2004, and are still.
Our prime objectives are:
- optimizing the life cycle of electric and electronic equipment by
- improving supply chains
- closing material loops
- reducing contamination
- increasing utilization of resources and reuse of equipment
- exercising concern about disparities such as the digital divide between the industrializing and industrialized countries
- increasing public, scientific and business knowledge
The steps that led to StEP
The intensive examination at UNU of the interrelation between electronic devices, especially computers, and the environment led to a book project, which was published under the title „Computers and the Environment“ in 2003. While working on the book, many more questions concerning this subject matter were identified. So the topic was expanded from computers to the whole field of electric and electronic equipment – the book grew into the development on this international initiative: StEP. Important Co-Initiators of the StEP project were Klaus Hieronymi, Hewlett Packard, Ruediger Kuehr and Eric Williams – both at UNU, and Axel Schneider, promotion team.
Click here to see the organizational structure and the actors of StEP.
