waste

Three of the biggest makers of TVs have formed a company to help manage the wave of electronics waste set to swell with the onset of digital television. Panasonic, Sharp, and Toshiba have launched the Manufacturers Recycling Management Co. in Minnesota.

That state last year enacted a law making vendors responsible for their brands' discarded electronics. MRM contracts with third-party recyclers including CRT Processing and Materials Processing Corporation, which specialize in handling tired monitors and televisions.

Old televisions and monitors are laced with lead, cadmium, and toxic flame retardants, but careful recycling can recover valuable and reusable metals and plastics.… Read more

Do the halls of malls give you a case of the jingle hells? You could kick back for a 20-minute break from rampant consumerism to learn more about the toxic mess it makes of the planet.

Fun, right? Actually, it is with The Story of Stuff. It's a short, friendly movie covering the ABCs of consumer culture. The sky may be falling, but we can prop it up, the film suggests.

The Story of Stuff was produced by Free Range Studios, makers of the Meatrix. That entertaining, animated diatribe against factory farming has attracted more than 15 million viewers. … Read more

Digital TV will bring a new world of entertainment to consumers and generate a big honking pile of electronic waste.

Roughly 80 million analog TVs will get heaved out in 2008 and 2009, according to John Shegerian, CEO of Electronic Recyclers (ER), one of the largest e-waste recyclers in the U.S., and someone is going to have to dispose of those old TVs properly. The glass in the tube consists of about 22 percent lead.

Even without the digital TV mandate (which kicks in on February 17, 2009), the e-recycling business is booming. Roughly 65 million pounds of e-waste … Read more

Two companies that deal in diapers have attracted notable funding within the past week, leaving Dan Primack of Private Equity Hub to muse about the rise of a "diaper bubble."

gDiapers, which makes eco-friendly diapers, announced yesterday that it raised an undisclosed sum from 2x Consumer Products Growth Partners and Golden Seeds angel investors. gDiapers' hybrid diapers, perhaps the Prius of the Pampers world, consist of a flushable, compost-ready insert that fits inside decorative cloth panties.

Online marketplace Diapers.com raised $7 million in Series B funding last week, mostly through Bessemer Venture Partners. The Web site sells … Read more

Dell is offering a new service to recycle tired electronics for small businesses. The program, which will wipe sensitive data from hard drives in the process, will cost $25 each of up to 10 pieces of hardware. Dell also offers companies the option to resell old equipment that remains valuable.

The company began its free curbside recycling pickup for consumers last September. Greenpeace and other environmental groups have given the company high marks for its takeback program. The Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition lists Dell as one of the nation's "responsible recyclers" that does not send e-waste to … Read more

After hinting heavily about an upcoming "Big Idea" contest, Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, Webby Awards founder Tiffany Shlain, and the folks at Geek Squad and IdeaFestival released details Monday.

The contest aims to generate a number of ideas that will address social, economic and environmental concerns. The winners will attend the IdeaFestival in Kentucky, which draws participants from a number of fields, ranging from the arts, music, entertainment, medicine and the media to discuss solutions around similar issues.

"You get to hear different points of view, from people with different backgrounds and that's where you come … Read more

Ze-Gen has pulled in a pile of money to make power from piles of trash.

The Boston-based company on Monday announced that it has secured $4.5 million in funding to carry through on its plans to build a facility that converts municipal solid waste into electricity.

As previously reported, Flagship Ventures led the financing which was joined by VantagePoint Venture Partners. The $4.5 million complements an initial $2.25 million in seed funding.

Next week, Ze-Gen will open a test facility in New Bedford, Mass, which will take construction site debris and pass it through a bath of … Read more

The drive for clean and green stuff/energy, etc. is in part a reaction to the supersized American consumer culture in general. Big houses, big cars, lots of stuff. All requiring more and more energy and fuel to drive around and get it, play with it, go to the show, etc. Browsing the depressing and completely paranoid LATOC site, I came across an interesting tidbit graphic:

Yes you read that right. 20.2 square feet of retail for every man, woman and child in America. 10X the world wide average (assuming it's true). Now the Europeans are small countries … Read more

It's hard to believe, but there was actually a time when gold USB drives were a rare commodity. Now, it seems like a rare week when we don't see one. But that, of course, won't stop us from rolling another one out.

And how can we resist, given the bargains that are to be had these days? The latest model from Israel's E-Jewel, for example, is a 14k specimen that holds 4GB of data for a mere $2,000, according to Coolest-Gadgets. That's a third less than the $3,500 key we cited only a … Read more