The Greening of the CIO - ' Safe Disposal Saves '
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Safe Disposal Saves Money
Negotiating a bargain price on a new desktop computer doesn't do you much good if you end up paying a $25,000 fine for improperly disposing of the thing, or if you lose critical data after someone scavenges the hard-drive from a recycled machine in the city dump. Careful disposal and recycling of computers and components can help protect the environment from nasty stuff like lead, mercury and cadmium. And it definitely will protect a company from some serious financial and information-security liabilities.
Regulators across the U.S. are making end-of-device-life planning a serious issue for corporate IT managers. In Califonia, individuals can face penalties of up to $25,000 per violation if the units are not disposed of in accordance with environmental standards, and the state has extended its current rules on collection and disposal of monitors to notebook and laptop computers. Other states are following California's lead, although the patchwork of state laws makes it hard to know what the standards are at any given moment.
"Nobody knows what new laws will be passed next, or where," says Richard Atanus, vice president of product development and customer service for monitor-maker NEC Display Solutions. But the trend is clear: "We expect the costs of recycling to increase 15 percent to 25 percent for displays, computers and notebooks in the next few years."
And yet many CIOs are MIA on disposal issues. "It's kind of sad, but a lot of large corporations have no awareness," says Atanus. "We are the ones educating our customers." NEC markets its monitors under the logo of the Environmental Protection Agency's Energy Star program, which denotes energy efficiency, and the company has been working with the federal government and other companies to create a new voluntary standard called EPEAT that certifies the amount of hazardous materials and recycled materials in a product, along with its energy usage and end-of-life program. But the education process can be difficult.
"IT groups are looking to make this year's budget, and end-of-life issues become the responsibility of different divisions, even individuals," Atanus says. "We put environmental and disposal issues in the context of total cost of ownership, including disposing of the product in three to five years, and that helps get people to start paying attention." An NEC spokesman says progress is being made in some quarters: Environmental concerns have jumped from the bottom to the middle of a 12-item list of topics and issues that play a role in purchasing decisions at large companies.
Many companies, meanwhile, think they are doing just fine on disposal issues. More than 95 percent of companies responding to a recent CIO Insight survey said they recycled old PCs, with the same percentage reporting that they also donate used computers to charity. Almost 60 percent said they do the same with old mobile phones.
But as with other environmental issues, says Braunstein, compliance often lacks the force of a mandate from the CIO. "With e-waste, people do a request for proposal and then go with the lowest price. Once they have the lowest price, out comes their checklist of disposal criteria, and their due diligence is just a guy saying, 'Yeah, we do this,' and it gets checked off. That's the level of risk mitigation going on today, and it will not hold. In the next year to 18 months, someone is going to get hammered."
If a company outsources e-waste disposal to a firm that disposes of it in an improper manner, hazardous materials that end up in the public landfill may be traceable to the original firm—and that company will be responsible for it. "Today it seems like everyone wants to be in the computer disposal business," says Kory Bostwick of PCdisposal.com, an Olathe, Kan., company that counts Time Warner Inc. and OfficeMax Inc. among its customers. "It's easy to say you are doing it right, but a lot of people who say they will dispose of your equipment according to standards probably won't."
Story Guide:
The Greening of the CIO
Energy Crisis in the Data Center
Companies Find Ways to Conserve
Safe Disposal Saves Money
Data Disposal
Sidebars:
Green Beyond Greenbacks
Solar Systems
Next page: Data Disposal
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