Can computing be green?

X-ray: Jake Carroll looks into the nasties inside your custom rig, and what impact they have on the environment.

This Xray, we're going to turn our backs on the hi-tech, crazy iron and bright lights of the usual X-Ray fare. Flashing LEDs, big PCBs and high-density transistor packages are taking a back seat.

We're going to get real, and get serious. It's time to think about the impact that our computing habit, hobby and professions are having on our world. Welcome to a very environmentally conscious X-Ray (ignore the fact that it is printed on paper that came from a tree somewhere. Trust us, we see the irony - and we do print as green as we can). It's time to save the little green (Fredz)frog.

Blood on our hands
As we sit and quaff our latte at the local place to be seen, browsing FaceBook on our rather stylish PDA, toting Bluetooth everything, we've got Earth's blood on our hands. Indirectly, we've all been a contributor to some kind of grand scale e-Waste and e-Environmental damage. Everything from the fabrication process of the PCB in the PDA and its conductive material, through to the process of smelting the metal required for the contacts on the storage card you have sitting in the back of it, is environmentally harmful.

For many years, a misnomer has existed that suggests hi-tech industry is a clean and forward-thinking way out of the previous generation's highly polluting and 'dirty' by-products. In the minds of many, the logical progression of the modern era (post 1800 AD) has put us on a path to a cleaner world. This however, is just the layer we see on the outside. As with many situations, things aren't always as they seem.

The problem spots
There are a few places dotted across the planet, that, for various reasons, have become a dumping ground for the majority of industrial nations' e-Waste. Keep in mind, it isn't always what they wanted either. Sometimes, economic and political factors drove them there, with little choice but to sell themselves out to the highest bidder, as a means to provide for their people. Worse than this, several nations are carrying out destructive mineral extraction, oftentimes leading to long-term damage of the surrounding ecosystem, not to mention the human cost. Here's a few of the darkest spots:

* 'Coltan' (Niobium) mining: the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
* The largest free e-Waste dumping grounds in the world: Dandora - Nairobi, Kenya.
* The CRT and LCD melting pot, the predominant home to 60 per cent of the world's CRT and LCD waste, imported and dumped illegally, dismantling and scavenging 1.5 million tonnes of CRT hardware per year, using seventeenth century smelting and rendering techniques: Guiyu, Southern China.
* The biggest mobile phone disintegrator on the planet: Eastern Delhi, India.

The makeup of E-Waste
E-Waste is bad. But, why is it bad? The chemicals and compounds that go into the manufacturing of electronics and computer components can be rounded into roughly two categories.

1. Organic compounds.
2. Heavy inorganic compounds and metals.

Organic compounds are found in many of our most treasured devices. When melted, burnt and incinerated some products release fumes, powders and vapours that are linked to biocumulative build-up in the blood and organs, leading to hormonal problems and long term neurological impacts. Watch out for these:

* Polychlorinated Biphenyls: Found in condensers, transformers and PSUs.
* Tetrabromo Bisephenol-A: Found in the thermoplastic fire retardant wiring in many PSU cases, case fans and GPU case covers.
* Polyvinylchloride (PVC): Found on many copper cables connecting your motherboard and surrounding hardware to its electrically conductive external components, whether it be a PSU, a BD-ROM drive or a hard disk's SATA cable.

Heavy metals and inorganic compounds, on the other hand, target the internal organs, such as the kidneys, liver and lungs, oftentimes having significant nervous system effects.

* Arsenic: Found in LEDs of all types, in the form of gallium arsenide. Common illnesses sustained while working with Arsenic include lung cancer, skin cancers and nerve conduction velocity related disorders.
* Barium: Found in the Getters of CRTs. The long-term effects of Barium are still largely unknown in humans, outside of heart weakness and muscle swelling.
* Beryllium: Found in PSUs. A common illness resulting in contact with Beryllium is Beryllicosis, presenting as poor wound healing and wart like bumps all over the body.
* Cadmium: Found in rechargeable Ni-Cad batteries from laptops, printer inks and contact-toner drums from larger grade photocopiers and laser printers. The most dangerous long-term exposure effect of Cadmium is kidney damage and progressive renal failure.
* Chromium VI: Found in magnetic tape storage. Permanent eye damage may result in repeated exposure to Chromium VI.
* Lead: CRT screens, PCBs and batteries from motherboard clips. Appetite loss, abdominal pain, kidney damage, neurological development retardation and birth defects are known effects.
* Mercury: Fluorescent lamps used in the backlight mechanism of LCD's. Similarly to lead, Mercury is known to cause long term and pre-natal neurological damage, amongst other terminal illnesses.
* Rare earth elements such as Yttrium and Europium: Fluorescent layer of CRT gates. Numbness, nail brittleness, hair loss and birth abnormalities particularly on digits of unborn children can result from long term exposure to a wide array of rare earth elements.