California Recycled One Billion Pounds of E-Waste

Recycle Electronics - All Green Electronics Recycling

Ever since the electronics recycling program in California began 6 years ago, one billion pounds of electronics have been recycled. This is more than any other state and amounts to approximately 20 million computers and televisions kept out of landfills.

According to our e-waste calculator on the All Green website, this has kept approximately 25,353,200,000 pounds of carbon emissions out of our atmosphere.

That is the equivalent to:

  • 4301000000 gallons of gas conserved
  • 977500000 trees planted
  • 36743700000 plastic bottles recycled
  • 169021100000 aluminum cans recycled

*These numbers are based off of the 20 million computers/ televisions statistic from the LA Times article.

There is one big thing that I couldn’t tell from the article: Does this number reflect all electronics recycled, or just those that recyclers get paid for? In the state of California, consumers pay a fee when they purchase an item with a screen larger than four inches. This money is used to pay recyclers. Other items—like printers, telephones, and VCRs—are still accepted by recyclers like us, the state just doesn’t pay for those.

Either way, this is a major accomplishment for the state. Do you think reaching 2 billion pounds by 2016 is a reasonable goal?

You can read the LA Times article here.

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