College move-out season is now in session, which means a lot of waste is bound to pile up, especially electronic waste. Students are often unsure of what to do with their old coffee maker that’s been leaking all semester, or their dingy microwave. Instead of throwing these well-loved items away, students can head over to Bath State Bank in West College Corner, Indiana, on Friday, May 16, between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. for its Electronic Waste Recycle Day.
At this event, many forms of electronic waste are eligible for recycling, from power strips and printers to toasters and tablets. E-waste, short for electronic waste, is defined as “any electrical or electronic equipment that’s been discarded.” E-waste’s prevalence has grown, as seen in 2022, when over 62 million tons of e-waste were produced worldwide, with only about a fifth of that waste collected and recycled.
So, what happens to the 80% of e-waste that does not get collected or recycled?
“E-waste comes from not only computers, but also the chemicals that are inside those computers,” said Dylan Fall, president of Miami University’s Humanitarian Youth Preparation for Electronics Education organization. “So, when they degrade in landfills, they are very toxic to the environment since they release toxic gases and reduce the quality of the air, making areas surrounding those landfills difficult to live in.”
Thinking twice about subjecting e-waste to a dumpster death is what prompted Bath State Bank to begin hosting its Electronic Waste Recycle Day.
“We started seeing a mass of computers and televisions dumped on the side of the road in our community, because they had no place to get rid of them,” said Ann Haas, Bath State Bank’s director of marketing. “Because of this, we decided to do a recycling day for Earth Day, and it was very successful.”
During its first e-waste recycling initiative in 2016, Bath State Bank recycled 13,850 raw pounds of electronic waste. Due to this success, Bath State Bank has begun to consistently host its Electronic Waste Recycle Day event.
“We tend to think that it’s about three years between people getting a new device and then disposing of it, so we host this event every three years,” Haas said.
For its most recent Electronic Waste Recycle Day in 2022, Bath State Bank partnered with Cobalt, a certified and family-owned recycling company dedicated to helping local businesses and citizens recycle e-waste effectively. Brittney Gill, director of client relations at Cobalt, spoke to the pertinence of effectively recycling e-waste.
“While electronic waste makes up only 2% of landfills, it makes up 70% of the pollution,” Gill said. “Slowly and surely, it adds up, and before you know it, we’re breathing in lithium iron from incorrectly disposed of batteries.”
Bath State Bank’s upcoming Electronic Waste Recycling event, alongside Miami’s upcoming ShareFest event from May 16 to May 21, are both sponsored by Cobalt and work to combat the slow and toxic buildup of e-waste.
Both ShareFest, located in Oxford and on Miami’s campus, and Bath State Bank’s event, located just across the border in Indiana, are accessible and welcome to Miami students. So, instead of toting around an old power strip and toaster after moving out in a couple of weeks, students can dispose of e-waste properly at these initiatives.
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“Electronic recycling is important, especially for Miami students,” Gill said. “This is the time when, stepping into their adulthood and thinking about their futures, they should also be thinking about the environmental future they are stepping into.”
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