Energy reduction is only part of making a Green ICT system, there is also the issue of use of materials and hazardous substances.
Electronic waste ("e-waste") is the material from unwanted electrical or electronic devices. Some e-waste can be sold for recycling and is described as "commodity" to distinguish it from "waste" which can't be reused. E-waste may contain toxic material is mostly not biodegradable.
Many countries have regulations covering e-waste, including bans from landfill in Europe. Metals, including gold and silver make some e-waste commercially viable to reprocess.
The Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and Their Disposal (1989) is an international treaty limiting the movement hazardous waste between nations. Australia, the EU and many developed nations, apart from the USA, have ratified the treaty.
Australia implemented the Basel convention with the Hazardous Waste (Regulation of Exports and Imports) Act (Commonwealth of Australia, 1989). This regulates export, import and transit of hazardous waste within Australia. The Criteria for the export and import of used electronic equipment (Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities, 2005) assumes that electronic equipment is hazardous waste, until shown otherwise. Equipment to be re-used (after repair, refurbishment or upgrading) are not considered hazardous waste. Australian states have regulations on the disposal of hazardous waste.
Byteback (2008) was an Australian partnership between Sustainability Victoria, the Australian Information Industry Association (AIIA), Apple, Canon, Dell, Epson, Fujitsu, Fuji-Xerox, HP, IBM, Lenovo, and Lexmark. It allows individuals and small businesses to deposit unwanted computer equipment at Victorian locations. Similar programs operated other states. These were replaced with a National Television and Computer Recycling Scheme funded by industry, under the Product Stewardship (Televisions and Computers) Regulations 2011 (Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities, 2012).
The Australian Computer Society has been operating a non-profit PC Recycling Group in South Australia, since 2000 (ACS, 2011).
The Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool (EPEAT, 2008) is a US based system for evaluating electronic products against 51 environmental criteria.
The criteria for EPEAT are contained in "Standard for Environmental Assessment of Personal Computer Products, Including Laptop & Desktop Computers & Monitors" (IEEE 1680-2006).
Products are ranked in three tiers:
Materials criteria are categorised as:
Energy conservation using US EPA Energy Star and Corporate performance with adoption of ISO 14001 are also criteria.
US Government agencies are required to procure products which meet 95 percent of the EPEAT criteria under "Executive Order: Strengthening Federal Environmental, Energy, and Transportation Management" (Bush, 2007).
The Electronics Environmental Benefits Calculator (Institute for a Secure and Sustainable Environment, 2008) was used to assess EPEAT. For 2007 reduction in use of primary materials was assessed at 75.5 tons, reduction in toxic materials of 3,220 tons, and avoidance in the disposal of 124,000 metric tons of hazardous waste.
The Calculator was sponsored by the U.S. EPA and estimates benefits, such as green house gas reductions, waste avoided, mercury eliminated for EPEAT purchases. Metrics used are:
The Calculator is provided as an Excel spreadsheet. Purchasing data input is the number and type of EPEAT products purchased. The tool calculates the environmental benefits from the EPEAT products in comparison with an average non-EPEAT product.