According to an international environmental forum, about 5 billion mobile phones will be thrown away in 2022. There are about 16 billion mobile phones around the world, but about a third of them are not used any more.
The amount of electronic waste (e-waste) keeps growing every year. Millions of washing machines, computers , refrigerators, and other electrical appliances are thrown away , amounting to 75 million tons of electronic waste per year.
This type of waste contains many valuable resources that can be reused, for example minerals, metals, or copper wires.
Only about a sixth of the world’s electronic waste is recycled. Recently, some countries have been taking steps to collect more e-waste, by setting up boxes in supermarkets, post offices and other places.
MikroLogika, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Words
- amount = how much of something
- billion = a thousand million = 1 000 000 000 000
- contains = to have in them
- copper = soft reddish brown metal
- electrical appliances = objects that you find in people’s homes and work with electricity
- environmental = about nature and the world around us
- forum = organization where people get together to discuss important topics
- recently = in the past few weeks or months
- recycle = to collect valuable things, so they can be used again
- resources = raw materials, metals etc…
- reused = used again
- set up = put in a place so that people can see them
- valuable = expensive
- wire = very thin piece of metal in the form of a thread