By Colin McGregor
Some people maintain that printing copies of newspapers or magazines is polluting and that digital versions of publications cause no environmental damage. But in fact, the world of the internet is very energy hungry and polluting.
An average internet user consumes about 365 kWh of electricity per year, requiring about 2,900 litres of water. This is the equivalent to the CO2 emitted during a 400 km car ride, according to the reference website energuide.be.
And digital material has its own environmental costs. A one megabyte (1 MB) email emits the equivalent of 20 g of CO2 in its life cycle, the equivalent of an old style 60 Watt bulb lamp lit for 25 minutes. Twenty large emails a day, and a user can generate the same emissions over the course of a year as a car travelling 1,000 km.
One hour of streaming a video produces the equivalent of 400 g of CO2, according to French researcher Basile Fighiera.
The production process of servers and computers seriously degrades the environment, but proof of this doesn’t show up in energy consumption statistics. Computers are made of different types of metals, toxic chemicals, and highly refined petroleum products.
Computers depend on rare metallic elements. These “rare earth metals,” as they are called, are a group of 17 metals that are found in the earth’s crust, but are not easily mined in concentrated ores. The extraction process uses a lot of toxic chemicals and large quantities of water. You have to go through enormous quantities of rocks to get out just a few grams of these metals, in general.
The devastation and the toxic legacy of mining metals, and their refinement, will endure for several generations to come.
Poor countries are especially hit hard by this situation. Most countries providing the basic material for computers are dictatorships, or ravaged by war, or both.
These places experience horrible human rights and environmental abuses. The number one extractor of rare earth metals in the world is China. According to the Government of Canada, 70% of the mining of these metals takes place in China, a nation not noted for its respect of human rights.
When servers, computers and tablets have outlived their usefulness, they often find themselves in garbage dumps. There are two categories of toxic waste when it comes from computer equipment. There are heavy metals such as mercury, lithium, lead and barium. Then there are flame retardants that produce toxic dioxins. If you leave a computer to rot in a dump, these materials can contaminate the soil and the water table. If these materials are shredded or burnt, even the air can become contaminated.
Lifespan
A magazine has a long lifespan. It can circulate and find new readers. Paper is recyclable, renewable and biodegradable. It can be recycled seven times over. Never throw your old magazines in the garbage, even if they’re in a bad state.
When recycled, books and magazines are baled and sent to a factory. They are sent through “pulpers,” machines that introduce water and chemicals to break the paper down into fibers. Then, the inks and adhesives are removed. The fibers bind together to be rolled and dried. They are then sent to make new products.
Recycled paper is used to make coffee filters, egg cartons, paper towels, toilet paper… The use of paper isn’t problematic for the environment. The forestry industry does its best to replant new trees and sustainably develop forests.
The carton of eggs in your fridge may be made from a 2024 edition of Reflet de Société!
Precious metals found in your computer equipment include:
Gold: Printed circuit boards, computer chips, central processing units (CPUs), connections.
Silver: Printed circuit boards, computer chips, keyboard membranes, some capacitors
Platinum: Hard drives, printed circuit boards (capacitors)
Copper: CPU heat sinks, wiring and cables, circuit boards, computer chips
Nickel: Components of printed circuit boards
Tantalum: Tantalum – Printed circuit board components (some capacitors)
Cobalt: Hard drives, lithium-ion rechargeable batteries
Aluminum: Printed circuit boards, computer chips, hard drives, heat sinks for processors
Tin: Printed circuit boards, computer chips
Neodymium: Hard drives (magnets)
– Source: Concept Management, Government of Canada
More About Cobalt
Cobalt is a metal used in lithium-ion batteries and in hard drives. We find cobalt in electric cars, portable telephones, portable computers, tablets, Bluetooth headphones and electric toothbrushes.
The Democratic Republic of Congo produces 70% of world supply. That translates into 170,000 metric tons per year. According to Siddharth Kara of Harvard University, author of Cobalt Red: How the Blood of the Congo Powers Our Lives, much of Congo’s cobalt is mined under slave-like circumstances. “People work in inhumane, harsh, and degrading conditions. They use picks and shovels to dig and excavate the earth in trenches, shafts, and tunnels to collect the cobalt.” They are paid only a few dollars a day for their hard and risky work. Children also participate in Congolese cobalt mining.
Canada represents 2% of world cobalt production. Cobalt is mined in Quebec, as a by-product of the exploitation of copper and nickel, at the Raglan mine in Nunavik.
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