The E-Waste Problem and How a Circular Economy Can Solve It The push for greener habits has become global, and for good reason. As this mentality is applied to waste produced by electrical and electronic equipment, we're seeing positive changes to the daily life of engineers.
The resources that we use to fuel our lives today, whether it be in the products we create or the ways that we power them, are finite. On top of this, much of what we make is littered rather than properly dealt with, even though much of it may be repurposed for different applications than their intended use. These issues and their solution, namely the circular economy, have the potential to change the abilities and resources at the hands of the everyday design engineer.
WEEE (waste electrical and electronic equipment), also commonly referred to as e-waste, is being looked into by many for the application of reuse, refurbishment or repurposing in order to truly get all we can from the products we create, whether that use is in their designed application or some new one. The products that are referred to in e-waste are split into six categories as per a research paper by PRé Consultants.They are:
AC-DC dual
ousehold appliances
Small household appliances