E waste Management

The electronic industry is the world’s largest and fastest growing manufacturing industry in the world. The increasing “market penetration” in developing countries, “replacement market” in developed countries and “high obsolescence rate” of electrical and electronic goods make electrical and electronic waste (e-waste) one of the fastest growing waste streams. E-waste is valuable source for secondary raw material but harmful if treated and discarded improperly as it contains many toxic components such as lead, cadmium, mercury, polychlorinated biphenlys etc. (Bandyopadhyay, 2010. The quantity of e-waste generated in developed countries equals 1% of total solid waste on an average and is expected to grow to 2% by 2010 (UNEP Manual, 2007).In United States alone, 1,30,000 computers and 3,00,000 cell phones are trashed each day (Anderson, 2010).The developed countries use most of the world’s electronic products and generate most of the E-waste (Basel Action Network, 2002).