Toshiba recently announced it was expanding its e-waste program to include copiers and printer cartridges; what are other computer industry leaders doing to contribute to the corporate quest for sustainability? For one, HP is making some notable strides with plastic inkjet cartridges.
HP’s PDR Recycling plant (PDR roughly translates from Bavarian as “products from recycled material”) is located in Thurnau, Germany and is nestled among several small and medium businesses that have created many jobs in the area.
At the HP service provider’s facility there, plastic inkjet cartridges are collected and sorted in order to begin the recycling process. Once the cartridges are sorted, any residual ink is removed and the cartridges are shredded. This is a vast departure from competitor’s cartridge recycling programs that mostly involve collecting and refilling the cartridges for redistribution. HP doesn’t believe that method passes their corporate quality standards.
HP collects the recyclable cartridges through three main sources:
- Manufacturing waste
- Non-salable units from resellers or returned and unused products from resellers
- Post-consumer cartridges that have been returned through retail stores or through cartridge collection programs or corporate pick-up programs
When cartridges go through HP’s innovative shredding process, the byproducts are small pieces of steel, plastic, copper and foam; this can vary depending on the exact type of cartridge. The byproducts are then sorted and sent to secondary processing facilities.
Foam and ink byproducts are used in waste-to-energy incinerators to create electricity; some are also sold for other uses on the scrap metal market. The plastic byproduct goes to a separate facility where it is combined with plastic from water bottle recycling and other additives in order to restore it to usable plastic that can be used in new cartridges.
By the beginning of 2011, over 1 billion HP Ink and LaserJet cartridges have been returned and recycled worldwide. This has all been made possible through the HP Planet Partners Return and Recycling program. This program was started in 1991, so in two decades since the program was started the achievements have been extraordinary. The numbers are impressive with regard to components of HP ink cartridges as well; the recycled plastic leaves a 22 percent smaller carbon footprint than its pure plastic counterparts. Fossil fuel is reduced by 50 percent and water consumption goes down by 69 percent per HP’s lifecycle assessment studies.
HP is currently researching ways to improve the recycling process further by separating the recyclable components before shredding. This will more efficiently prepare the components for recycling.
HP’s efforts haven’t stopped with just ink cartridges; the company also provides convenient ways to recycle computer equipment, cell phones, and rechargeable batteries. In most cases, postage-paid packaging can be used to return these items to an HP center.
HP is also passing the benefits of its green initiatives on to customers through its HP Renew Program – several lines of servers and storage options can be purchased to extend the usable life of IT hardware and also make it more accessible to people who might not otherwise have the opportunity to buy new technology.
In today’s age of stricter IT budgets, HP offers a viable option by taking products that are customer returns, cancelled orders, demo units, and lease returns and “recycling” them to consumers. The units are carefully inspected, refurbished or remanufactured as needed, and re-boxed. An HP limited warranty is even offered on these units that have eighteen months or less of original use.
HP performs the same service with several items that are more than eighteen months old: larger servers, superdomes, workstations, business desktops, and business monitors. These programs are offered to customers within the United States; similar programs are offered for customers worldwide.
On a global level, HP is working hard to prove it is doing its part in the industry-wide effort to contribute less e-Waste to the environment.
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