While most people know that electronic waste involves electronics, they aren’t sure how it works. As recycling involves so many steps, this is understandable. Here’s a list of definitions to help you understand our customers’ questions.
Electronic Waste (e-waste)
Devices such as electronic or electrical devices have reached their end of life.
Toxic Waste
Toxic waste is any chemical waste product capable of causing death, illness, or injury. A wide range of household appliances and electronic devices contain substances.
Zero Waste
The conservation of all resources employs responsible production, consumption, reuse, and recovery of all products, packaging, and materials, without burning them or discharging them to land, water, or air that threaten the environment or human health.
End of Life (EOL)
It is the point at which a product no longer serves its purpose. It is essential to recycle and properly dispose of the Waste.
End of Use (EOU)
When a product is no longer valid for its original purpose but can be used for something else, it is called reuse.
Alkaline batteries
Alkaline battery is commonly used in many household items such as MP3 players, CD players, digital cameras, toys, flashlights, and radios. They contain zinc and manganese dioxide, a cumulative neurotoxin that can be toxic in higher concentrations.
Nickel metal hydride batteries
A nickel metal hydride battery is a rechargeable battery. People are using it as a substitute for non-rechargeable alkaline batteries. It features a slightly lower but generally compatible cell voltage and is less prone to leaking and explosion.
Lithium-ion
These are typically more expensive batteries but can be recharged repeatedly. Lithium-ion batteries are primarily used in consumer electronics like laptops and electric vehicles.
Carcinogens
Cancer-causing substances can be released into the air from improperly disposed of electronics.
Certificate of Destruction
When a hard drive is destroyed, a certificate verifying the data’s complete deletion and destruction is issued.
Chain of Custody
The documentation shows the acquisition, transfer, handling, and disposition of physical and electronic materials.
Data Destruction
Destroying data is a process that renders it unreadable or irretrievable, making the data useless.
Data Breach
The term data breach refers to the copying, sending, viewing, stealing, or using of confidential or sensitive data by an unauthorized individual. Other terms include unintentional disclosure of information, data leaks, information leakages, and data spills.
Degaussing
A physical destruction method scrambles the magnetic sectors on the disk and damages internal components such as the read/write heads.
Electronics Recycling: The process used to recover valuable materials from the electronics, such as metal, glass, or plastic.
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
An independent executive agency of the United States federal government is responsible for environmental protection. It is responsible for maintaining and enforcing national standards in consultation with state, tribal, and local governments.
HIPAA
Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. An Act to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1996 to improve portability and continuity of health insurance coverage in the group and individual markets, to combat Waste, fraud, and abuse in health insurance and health care delivery, to promote the use of medical savings accounts, to improve access to long-term care services and coverage, to simplify the administration of health insurance, and for other purposes.
Identity Theft
They are fraudulently acquiring and using a person’s personal identifying information, usually for financial gain. If electronic devices are disposed of improperly, this can occur.
Incineration
It is the act of burning something at a high temperature to break as much of it down into ash as possible.
ITAD (Information Technology Asset Disposition)
In today’s world, online safety and data security are more critical than ever. To ensure the privacy and safety of your computing devices, IT Asset Disposition (ITAD) is essential.
Landfills
Dumping grounds for solid waste, municipal or industrial. Household and commercial trash are disposed of in municipal landfills. At the same time, hazardous Waste from factories and other industrial facilities is disposed of in industrial landfills. Dumps are harmful to the environment. It produces Waste that can be toxic to plants and animals and pollute groundwater.
Refurbishing
It involves repairing or replacing specific components (hardware or software) of a product so that it can last longer and be reused.
Shredding
In this process, a hard drive is physically destroyed. Information-containing disks are broken into small pieces and mixed with material from hundreds of other hard drive fragments. Shredding is the most effective way to destroy data.
Responsibly recycling your electronics is not only good for your health and planet but can be good for your wallet. When you recycle with Urban E Recycling, you can be guaranteed that your data will be destroyed and securely disposed of.
Hold on, did we mention that our services are FREE? What are you waiting for? Schedule a pick-up today.
Mother Nature doesn’t want your old computers but we do.
