Introduction
Traditionally, the handling of waste has been the responsibility of local governments and municipalities. In addition, during the past 60 years or so, the industrial paradigm for the manufacturing of consumer goods has been to design and manufacture products for a single life cycle: minimizing material use (so as to minimize cost), so that products are less expensive but have to be discarded upon failure or obsolescence, rather than being repaired. One could argue that the fast evolution in technology is a significant driver of this trend. In industrialized countries, it is often more expensive to repair an electronic product or appliance than to buy a new one. For consumer electronics, this is partly ...
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