e-Stewards® today announced that Sony Electronics has joined as a member of a growing number of e-Stewards Enterprise companies. These corporations and institutions are committed to using the most globally responsible recycling companies that are certified to the e-Stewards standard.

A former e-scrap executive has been sentenced to one year in a federal prison for storing hazardous CRT waste without a permit.

AFTER MANY YEARS of treating the developing world as its environmental dumping ground, the U.S. is finally getting a taste of what it feels like to be on the receiving end of another country’s dangerous garbage. DuPont-spinoff Chemours is sending industrial waste from the Netherlands to North Carolina. The waste in question comes from the production of the toxic chemical GenX, DuPont’s replacement for the surfactant PFOA, which was long used in the production of Teflon and many other products.

The Philippines over the weekend shipped back to South Korea tons of garbage stored in 51 container vans, officials said Monday, six months after the trash arrived in the port of Tagoloan, in southern Misamis Oriental province.

Interpol, the world’s largest international police organization, has carried out a global investigation into marine pollution crime, and identified more than 500 offenses.

People living near Matahari Terbit Beach in Sanur, Bali, work together to clear trash, mainly plastic bottles and food packaging, from the beach. (JP/Zul Trio Anggono)

At a press conference in Quezon City on Wednesday, members of EcoWaste Coalition call for the swift return to South Korea of some 6,500 tons of garbage illegally transported to the Philippines in July last year. A customs official announced that the first of two shipments—which slipped through Tagoloan port in Misamis Oriental province—must be returned to their country of origin by Jan. 9. INQUIRER PHOTO/ JAM STA ROSA

The Digital Divide continues to impact poor and rural communities where access to affordable high-speed Internet, quality computer equipment, and digital literacy is lacking. Over the past two years, Cascade Asset Management, an e-Stewards certified processor headquartered in Madison, WI, has partnered with DANEnet, a local non-profit engaged in promoting Digital Equity in the community, to address these concerns.

Plastic is still fantastic, despite the trade and environmental headaches, insists e-scrap plastics expert Craig Thompson. But we need to process more at home rather than relying on unsustainable export markets. ‘If they are not doing so already, businesses involved in e-scrap worldwide will have to reshape.’

For over two decades, many developed countries have sent massive amounts of plastic wastes to China for recycling.

But that option is drying up following a Chinese ban on rubbish imports this year, forcing countries, particularly developed nations, to seriously rethink how to process their unwanted materials - a question that have been dodged for many years.

The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) is eyeing to take legal action against the “importers” of purportedly recyclable materials, which turned out to be mixed garbage containing hazardous wastes from South Korea.

The European Commission has published a notice to stakeholders that states all exports of waste for disposal and the export of mixed municipal waste for recovery from the EU-27 to the UK will be prohibited if the UK exits the EU with “no deal”.

A group of environmentalists on Wednesday urged the government to go after public officials and other people responsible in the smuggled garbage shipment from South Korea which arrived at a Mindanao port five months ago.

A Canadian e-scrap operator has filed a defamation lawsuit against the Basel Action Network (BAN) after the Seattle-based watchdog group accused the business of exporting electronics to developing nations.

Photo credit: Ulf Wittrock/Shutterstock

A police raid on the Wai Mei Dat Thai Recycling factory, 100km east of Bangkok last month revealed a shocking find. The 40-acre complex was laden with huge piles of electronic waste – keyboards, motherboards, electrical wires, computer screens and smartphone batteries, just to name a few.

Federal regulators are considering a proposal to ban exports of unprocessed e-scrap and require stringent tracking procedures for exports that are still allowed.

Despite the Hong Kong Convention, dismantling ships for raw materials or parts remains a dangerous, lawless industry.