E-waste Solutions that Go Beyond the “Reuse Art Project”

Recently on MotherJones.com, Kiera Butler  posted a “solution” to the “Econumdrum” of what to do with old computer media such as floppy discs.

Having just come from the State of Green Business Forum in San Francisco, I couldn’t help but shake my head… and respond. We don’t more solutions that make progressive, environmentally minded professionals look like hop-heads. And, we don’t need “solutions” that will, in the long run, actually make the situation worse.

So, while I acknowledge that Ms. Butler had the best of intentions–and even a fun idea–I encourage her in this copy of my response post–to dig deeper to better solutions. Was her post tongue-in-cheek? Probably a little. But, we need–and already have–good solutions (see below for links) to problems such as e-waste, and we need to push forward with more in the mode that consumers–even green consumers–want and need: fast, simple, economical appealing solutions that improve our lives and protect the planet. As innovative businesses, we need to send the message that we are doing just that.

Here’s my post, and tell me what you think of this issue:

Look, I appreciate the intent here, but this is the wrong idea for several reasons.

First, Ms. Butler instructs folks to turn their media waste into another waste product that will ultimately get land-filled when the creator gets sick of looking at it or has a change of taste. And, at that time, it will be more likely to get land-filled than it is before the project was executed because it is harder to disassemble. Plus, you’ve added/consumed more toxic chemicals in the project than you started with when you just had your discs.

Second, Ms. Butler perpetuates the myth (or, at least what I thought was a myth, before I read this post) that progressives looking to save humanity from itself are tail-chasing, clueless dreamers who don’t have a foothold in reality and think e-waste art projects are viable solutions to our overwhelming problems. Sure, there are some of those out there–and a certain about of found-object art is fine–but there are also a lot of us who are very technologically, economically, and design savvy who know that solutions like these are ultimately counter-productive, no matter how well-intentioned. I actually think Ms. Butler falls into the latter category and should stick to that image.

What we really need are true life-cycle solutions for slick, cool products that actually make our lives better and more fun. For the stuff that was designed before designers had even heard of cradle-to-cradle? Enter folks like GreenDisk.com (http://www.greendisk.com/) and GRX Recycling/Metech Recyling (http://www.metechrecycling.com/) who are actually harvesting materials from these media (and electronics) and putting them back into the manufacturing stream.

It isn’t a perfect system, but recycling–in this instance–is a far sight better than the “reuse” suggested here. And, having just come from the State of Green Business Forum last week (http://www.greenbiz.com/stateofgreenbusinessforum2010) seeing posts like this one–even targeting consumers–just makes me shake my head. We can do so much better than this suggestion for “reuse”!

I encourage Ms. Butler to dig a little deeper and look for savvier solutions to our consumer waste problems. They are out there, and she would be doing folks a tremendous service by promoting them through her blog.