E-waste: Negative Effects on The Environment and Humanity

Introduction

In several decades, the electronics industry has been developed rapidly. The frequency of people changing electronic equipment is getting higher, which leads to a significant increase in electronic and electrical waste (e-waste, or WEEE). There are a majority of valuable resources that can be extracted by e-waste through recycling. However, considerable debate about whether e-waste is dangerous is expending in the public. Some people consider that there is no significant relationship between children’s IQ with e-waste, and the formal e-waste recycling behaviors can efficiently decrease the soil pollution caused by e-waste. In this essay, I will argue that e-waste is actually dangerous, which means that e-waste has negative impacts on the ecosystem and people’s health, in addition, although formal recycling behavior decreases the metal pollution in the soil, e-waste still exists the huge amount of risk for the people.

Negative Impacts of E-Waste 

On ecosystem

The first aspect to point out is the ecosystem. There is evidence showing that heavy metal, which can contaminate the soil, is produced during e-waste processing activities. According to the research of Luo et al. (2010, p. 484), compared with agricultural soil, the pH of most reference e-waste soil is between 5.5 and 7.0, which exceeds the Chinese Standard for Agricultural Soils and Dutch standards due to the heavy metal pollution. This is because the harmful substances form e-waste processing exactly influence the value of the pH of the soil. As a result of that, e-waste land becomes poisonous for farming. Besides, the recycling behavior of e-waste, especially burning e-waste, which releases the metal elements also leads to soil pollution. Because of the recycling behavior, the metal is enriched in the e-waste burning plants, and the values of metal, like Pb, Cu and Cr, are higher than the Dutch standards that are environment pollutant reference values (Luo et al., 2010, P. 484). Given the evidence above, it is valid to conclude that the handling of e-waste not only does harm to arable land but also releases excessive values of metal elements which may overtake the safety standard (Dutch standard); therefore, e-waste is dangerous and destructive to the soil.

Moreover, water or water systems can also be polluted by e-waste. The heavy metal from e-waste could acidify the water by changing the pH value of the water. Depends on the survey of Wu et al. (2014, P. 221), compared with the tape-water, the sample water which contains different levels of heavy metal from different e-waste sites has been significantly acidified, the pH of sample water is lower than the safety pH level. Simultaneously, the research also confirms that in the past several decades, due to e-waste recycling activity, acid water was poured into the stream, and finally, flow into the pound, resulting in pond water acidification and heavy metal pollution. The heavy metal produced by e-waste and recycling activities makes the water undrinkable. Besides that, recycling behaviors and heavy metal are the reason why the underground water and aquatic systems are polluted. Luo et al., (2010, P. 484 and 486) emphasizes that pouring the e-waste beside the pond is normal behavior, the metal of e-waste can accompany the rain into aquatic systems. On the other hand, the extremely high value of Cu comes from the e-waste incineration site will raise the pollution risk to underground water (Luo et al., 2010, P. 486). The e-waste processing activities can make the water acidic and then contaminate the whole aquatic systems. Consequently, e-waste is dangerous for water or water resource.

Another statement for e-waste is that the plants could be contaminated by e-waste. Burning e-waste releases the smoke that contains the harmful substances into the open air, which can be absorbed by the plants firstly, this is the reason why the shoots of plant samples have high metal accumulation (Luo et al., 2010, P. 486). The plants near the e-waste sites will be poisoned when absorbing the heavy metal and toxic elements from the smoke, and it is obviously harmful to the growth of plants. Similarly, vegetables can also be negatively influenced by e-waste in the same way. As Wang, et al., (2012, p.190) found, the polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are concentrated in the vegetables due to e-waste opening burning[8]. Apparently, they also figured out that because of the PAHs and other harmful substances, the vegetables nearby the e-waste sites are inedible. The PAHS or other toxic elements from the e-waste can seriously poison the plants, especially the nearby vegetables. If these vegetables or plants are eaten by mistake, it may pose risks to human health; therefore, e-waste is still dangerous.

On people

There is a claim that the lead from e-waste is not associated with the decrease in children’s IQ. Wang et al., (2012, P. 109-110) made a comparison among the children from Lanxi, Luqiao, and Chuanan, and the IQ test results do not have statistically significant, which means there is no obvious relationship between the Blood Lead Levels (BLLs) and IQ. Besides, their experiment still reaches the same conclusion after determining other possible covariates. Children come from three reference areas that have different levels of BLLs, apparently, the specimen’s IQ is almost stable at the same level about 110, which illustrates that although children who have higher the BLLs come from e-waste area (Luqiao), the IQ levels are not directly influenced by lead, thus e-waste might not influence the children’s IQ negatively.

This may be true to some extent; however, e-waste can damage children’s hearing. There is no doubt that higher Pb levels increase the risk of deafness. The average blood Pb levels of children in the e-waste-exposed area are higher than that of other areas, which could cause higher risks of losing hearing. According to the comparison of different reference groups, they state that the children who live in the e-waste area have a higher prevalence of hearing loss in single or both ears because the children nearby the e-waste area generally have higher blood Pb levels which are associated frequently with children’s hearing loss. The data of different children’s hearing thresholds in the study of Liu, et.al, (2017, p.625) showed that the P-value of 0.5, 1 and 2kHz are 0.05, less than 0.01 and less than 0.01, having a significant correlation which states that children who were exposed to potential toxicants have a lower ability to recognize for hearing low-frequency sound, especially 0.5, 1 and 2kHz. Although lead could not lower the children’s IQ, sufficient evidence and data show that e-waste still has a higher risk of damaging hearing or even losing hearing for children, meaning that e-waste is dangerous to health.

Another aspect of the impacts of e-waste on health is that e-waste will lead to a higher risk of suffering from cancer. Cr is a major health risk factor for cancer. In the recycling behaviors of e-waste, the workers are exposed under the different pollutants, and the harmful substance can be enriched on the body, increasing the risk of lifetime cancer. As the study of Sing, Thind, and John (2018, P. 432) shows, the amount of Cr on the skin of workers in e-waste sites is 192.59 times of the reference value, and workers exposed to Cr have a higher cancer risk than normally acceptable value. The present study has mentioned that the PAHs can be released by burning e-waste, which contains the toxic elements that can also improve the risk of cancer. According to the survey results for e-waste sites soil, Carcinogenic PAHs (PAHscarc) in soil occupied a huge percentage and the carcinogenic substances, like BkF, are the main element of PAHs (Wang et al, 2017., P. 22175). E-waste makes the worker expose under the huge cancer risks. If the smoke that contains the toxic elements, like BkF, spreads through the air, the residents nearby the e-waste sites might also have negative influences, therefore e-waste is harmful and dangerous for people’s health because of the Cr and PAHs.

E-waste recycling

One argument for considering e-waste unharmful is the fact that the formal recycling behavior can decrease the concentration of heavy metal of e-waste. Fujimori et al., (2012, P. 142) made a comparative analysis, in the soil of informal e-waste recycling sites, the values of Zn and Pb are obviously higher than the formal sites and some special heavy metal pollution also exist in the informal recycling sites, which illustrate that formal recycling behavior effectively reduce the concentration of metal pollution from the e-waste. The formal e-waste recycling sites have Isolated working environment, making it possible for the soil to not enrich the heavy metal. The pollutants, like Pb, Cd and As in the formal soil are not concentrated, because formal recycling e-waste sites might isolate the surface soil (Fujimori et al., 2012, P. 141). The formal e-waste recycling sites might have strict rules and regulations, making the heavy metal pollution to isolate the soil, which can efficiently reduce the generation of metal pollution, thus formal e-waste recycling can make e-waste to deduce the detriment, besides, people have an efficient method to handle the e-waste, which can make the e-waste to be not dangerous.

Although there are some claims that formal recycling behavior can lower the value of metal pollution in soil, the risk still exists in the dust of both formal and informal e-waste recycling sites. In Fujimori, el at, (2012, p. 143) statistics, the value of Ni and Cu in the formal e-waste recycling sites’ dust is 2100 mg/kg and 26,000 mg/kg, which are remarkably higher than the informal sites, which indicates that formal recycling can not decrease the concentration of metal pollution in the dust. On the other hand, formal recycling can also not decrease the health risk to adults and children. Based on calculation and comparison, the metal hazard index (HI) in the formal recycling sites dust of adults is moderate (4.6) and children’s HI is 37 which is 3.7 times higher than safety standard, however, the maximum value of adults HI is 61, the children’s HI is 490, (Fujimori et al., 2012, P. 144). Although the average value of adult dust HI shows that it has a mid-dangered result, it still significantly exists the health risk for adults as well as children. The formal e-waste recycling behavior can efficiently decrease the value of pollution in the soil, however, it cannot decrease the heavy metal of the dust. Therefore, both informal and formal e-waste recycling behavior can not obviously decrease the damage of e-waste.

Conclusion

In light of all the factors stated above, attempts at claiming that the e-waste is not harmful and dangerous are insufficient in several points, as clearly shown in this essay, do cause obvious harm and dangerous to the ecosystem and people. The heavy metal caused by e-waste recycling, like Pb and Cr, and PAHs are the main toxic substances, which result in serious damage to the environment. In addition, due to these harmful elements, the health risks of people also increase directly and indirectly. Although some e-waste recycling behavior can decrease the harm of e-waste, it is still not enough, and the risks and damages still exist in the recycling behaviors. Clearly, in the future, to keep healthy, all workers who engage in the e-waste recycling industry should have high-level protection, and their children should be far away from the e-waste recycling area. Governments should enforce the related law or policy to limit the e-waste in order to protect the ecosystem and public health.  

References

1. Luo, X., Wang, J., Li, H., & Zhou, W. (2010). Investigation of heavy metal contamination in raw materials and final products of a typical Cu smelting factory in China. Environmental Monitoring and Assessment, 165(1-4), 481-490.

2. Wu, J., Xu, X., Xie, P., Yao, Q., Wang, J., & Zhou, Y. (2014). Pollution characteristics of heavy metals in aquaculture water and products from the Yangtze River Delta of China and potential health risk assessment. Ecotoxicology and Environmental Safety, 108, 161-167.

3. Wang, L., Zhang, L., Zhang, H., Guo, Y., & Luo, J. (2012). Health risk assessment of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in vegetables from Hunan Province, south central China. Ecotoxicology and Environmental Safety, 78, 23-30.

4. Liu, Y., Yekeen, T. A., Chen, Y., Li, J., Wu, M., Yan, X., ... & Yu, Z. (2017). Exposure assessment of lead and cadmium via intake of water and food by residents in the vicinity of an e-waste site, China. Ecotoxicology and Environmental Safety, 145, 620-625.

5. Sing, T. S., Thind, P. S., & John, S. (2018). Health risk assessment of workers exposed to lead at informal electronic waste recycling sites in India. Environmental Science and Pollution Research, 25(5), 4321-4334.

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6. Fujimori, T., Itai, T., Hirai, H., Onozuka, D., Kajiwara, N., & Takigami, H. (2012). Heavy metal contamination in surface soil of electronic waste recycling sites in Nigeria. Environmental Health and Preventive Medicine, 17(2), 134-141.