Ohio eWaste Recycling - Electronics Recycling & Destruction Facility! Central Ohio, Columbus, Ohio

Hazardous Materials in eWaste

Certain components of some electronic products contain materials that render them hazardous to the environment once the materials end up in a landfill or if they are improperly managed and disposed. For instance, Ohio law does not currently view nonfunctioning CRTs (cathode ray tubes) from televisions and monitor as hazardous, although steps are being made to ensure ewaste in Ohio is disposed of properly.

Below is a list of hazardous or toxic components of e-waste and where they may be found:

Antimony trioxide - a flame retardant, added to cathode ray tube monitor (CRT) glass, found in printed circuit boards and cables

Arsenic - in older cathode ray tubes and in light emitting diodes

Barium - in the CRT

Beryllium - often allied with copper to improve copper's strength, conductivity and elasticity. Old motherboards, contact springs found in printed circuit boards, relays, and in the mirror mechanism of laser printers. In power supply boxes which contain silicon controlled rectifiers and x-ray lenses

Cadmium - circuit boards and semiconductors Rechargeable NiCd-batteries, fluorescent layer (CRT screens), printer inks and toners, photocopying-machines (printer drums)

Chlorofluorocarbon (CFC) - Cooling unit, Insulation foam

Chromium - in steel as corrosion protection, Data tapes, floppy-disks, circuit boards, photocopying-machines (printer drums)

Cobalt - component in steel for structural strength and magnetivity

Lead - cathode ray tubes, solder, batteries, printed wiring boards (circuit boards), solder on components

Lithium - batteries

Mercury - switches (mercury wetted) and housing, fluorescent lamps providing backlighting in liquid crystal displays (LCDs) for monitors and laptops, batteries, printed circuit boards

Nickel - batteries, electron gun in CRT , printed circuit boards

Polybrominated flame retardants (including polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB), polybrominated biphenyls (PBB), Polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDE), and tetrabromo bis-biphenol-a (TBBA)) - plastic casings, cables, and circuit boards, condensers, transformers

Polyvinyl chloride (PVC) - Cable insulation

Selenium - circuit boards as power to supply rectifier, photocopying-machines (printer drums)

Zinc - interior of CRT screens, printed circuit boards

There are many sites that can provide more information on the toxics in e-waste, including: