IT Asset Disposal:
“Please Don’t Dump Me”
1Norazila Samuri, 2Nor Zairah Ab. Rahim, 3Suraya Binti Yaacob
1
Razak Faculty of Technology and Informatics, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
2
Razak Faculty of Technology and Informatics, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
3
Razak Faculty of Technology and Informatics, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Abstract
E-waste is a global issue that threatens all developing countries including Malaysia. Poor e-waste management not only affects a country, but also destroys human capital development as it involves the environment, health and human security. E-waste is an element that includes the disposal of IT assets, also known as IT disposal which also included in Green IT element. The development of electronic items, gadgets and IT devices led to the overflow of e-waste that was increased from time to time. Therefore, this study was conducted to identify current status of e-waste and IT disposal in Malaysia, process of IT disposal and coordination between e-waste, IT disposal and Green IT.
Keywords— e-waste; Green IT;IT disposal; IT devices; coordination.
I. INTRODUCTION
E-waste which also known as electronic waste can be referred as any electrical and electronic equipment that cannot be used, discarded, and obsolete. Based on OECD, e-waste can be described as any electrical device that has reached its end of life (OECD, 2001). Without proper procedure that being conducted, e-waste can become a hazardous threat to the human and entire world. Based on European Union (EU), there were some categories of e-waste as listed in Table 1.
TABLE 1 : CATEGORY OF E-WASTE BY EU.[1][2]
Based on a guideline of e-waste in Malaysia produced by Department of Environment (DOE), any electrical equipment that has at least one of the following criteria, can be considered as e-waste (as listed in Table 2).
No Code Category
1 Large HA Large household appliances 2 Small HA Small household appliances 3 ICT IT and telecommunication
equipment
4 CE Consumer equipment 5 Lighting Lighting equipment
6 E&E tools
Electrical and electronic tools (with the exception of large- scale stationary industrial tools)
7 Toys Toys, leisure, and sports equipment
8 Medical
devices Medical devices
TABLE 2 : CRITERIA OF E-WASTE IN MALAYSIA. [3]
II. EFFECTOFE-WASTE
E-waste can cause harmful to the environment, human and health if the impropriate process being conducted to manage e-waste. A lot of chemical and toxic based component contains in an electronic will end up in land fill as listed in Table 3.
TABLE 3: E-WASTE TOXIC COMPONENTS AND EFFECTS TO HUMAN [4]
The obsolete computer, televisions and other electrical devices contain toxic which will cause harmful effects when it is mixed with soil and air. All of these disease and harmful effects can be decrease by implementing proper management and disposal of e-waste including IT disposal. A good manufactured company should mention the disposal method for their product in the user manual. [5].
III. E-WASTEINMALAYSIA
About 688,068 tonnes of e-waste were generated a year in Malaysia which is equivalent with the weight of 1264 Airbus A380 plane and each Malaysian had produced 24 kg of e-waste that equivalent with 184 iPhone per year as illustrated in Figure 1.
No. Criteria
1 A defect that materially affects its functionality
2 Physical damage that impairs its functionality or safety, as defined in the specification
3 a faulty hard disc drive and a faulty Random Access Memory (RAM) and a faulty Video Card
4 batteries made with lead, mercury or cadmium or lithium or nickel that are unable to be charged or to hold power 5 insufficient packaging to protect it from damage during
transportation, loading and unloading operations 6
the appearance of the equipment or components are generally worn or damaged, thus reducing the marketability of the equipment
7 the electrical and electronic equipment or components are destined for recycling or recovery or disposal
8 the electrical and electronic equipment or components are discarded, or are intended or are required to be discarded 9 there is no regular market for the used electrical and
electronic equipment or components
10 the used equipment or components are old and out dated, and destined for salvaging purpose
11 end-of-life electrical and electronic equipment 12
for the importing purposes, the age of the electrical and electronic equipment or components is not more than three years (3) from the date of manufactured
13 Products or goods produced by partially e-waste recovery facilities.
Toxic Material Birth Defects Brain Damage Heart, Lung, Liver & Spleen Damage Kidney Damage Nervous/ Reproductive System Damage Skeletal System Damage
Barium X X
Cadmium X X X X X
Lead X X X X
Lithium X X X X X
Mercury X X X X
Nickel X X X X
Palladium X X X X
Rhodium X
Silver X X X X X
Fig.1 : Amount of E-waste Generation in Malaysia
Thus, the top five e-wastes among Malaysian’s items were washing machine, air conditioner, refrigerator, personal computer and television. Figure 2 shows the estimated amount of e-waste generation in Malaysia. The main contributor of e-waste in Malaysia was personal computer (44%), and then followed by television (28%), air conditioner (17%), refrigerator (7%) and washing machine (4%).
Fig.2 : Estimated Amount of E-waste Generation by type of device in Malaysia [6].
The process of dumping of IT equipment can be referred as IT disposal which is one of the elements in Green IT. Green IT can be described as any action and practice of designing, manufacturing, using and disposal of IT device including network devices and storage efficiently with minimal harmful to the environment [7]. There were three main elements consist in IT disposal:
recovery, refurbish, recycle which were very significance for Green IT.
IV. COORDINATION OF E-WASTE,IT DISPOSAL AND GREEN IT.
IT disposal is one of the element in e-waste and also an element of Green IT. Therefore, the intersection of both elements can be referred as IT disposal is proper subset of e-waste and proper subset of Green IT in mathematic quote as illustrated in Figure 3.
Fig.3 : Coordination of e-waste, IT disposal and Green IT.
IT disposal has three main elements: recovery, refurbish, and recycle. Recovery is a process of retrieving all the inaccessible data if IT equipment had shown obsolete signal and need to be discarded[8]. Refurbish can be described as the process of replacing the obsolete component, upgrading into new technology in IT equipment so that the equipment become used equipment but still can function properly.
e-w ast e i n M al ay si a 688,086 tonnes of
e-waste was generated a year in Malaysia
Equals to weight of 1264
planes of Airbus A380.
Each Malaysian discarded of e-waste per year
iPhone.
24
k gwhich is equivalent with
184
e-waste Washing machine Mobile phone
Refrigerator
Air conditioner
E-waste
Green IT IT Disposal
IT design
IT manufactured
IT usage
Refurbish Recycle Recovery
The last phase and element of IT disposal was recycle which can be referred as the process of segregation the component of IT equipment, sent to recycle center and being handle by licensed organization. Recycle is crucial part as in this phase, all the component of IT equipment need to be segregate base on the components such as metal, lead, mercury, plastic, arsenic, cadmium, copper, gold, palladium, aluminum, and steel. In order to ensure the implementation of Green IT become successful, recycle part is a compulsory process in each person and organization to stay in sustainability life.[9]-[17].
V. AWARENESS ABOUT IT DISPOSAL IN MALAYSIA.
A simple survey had been conducted among students in one of the Public Institution of Higher Education in Malaysia to identify their knowledge about IT disposal and e-waste. There were fifty (50) respondents being involved to answer the questionnaire.
Fig.4 : Percentage of respondent’s knowledge about e-waste term.
Based on the survey that being conducted, there were 38% of the respondents were never heard about e-waste (as illustrated in Figure 4). Then, 36% of them realize the term of e-waste but they do not really concern about the term. Only 26% of the respondents understand the e-waste term. If they were not aware the term of e-waste, how they want to implement e-waste management in their daily life?.
Fig.5 : Percentage of respondent’s knowledge about IT disposal term.
Based on Figure 5, most of the respondents were aware the existence of IT disposal but they do not really understand and concern about the term (57%). Meanwhile, another 32% of the respondents were never heard about IT disposal and only 11% of the respondents understand the IT disposal term.
Then, the respondents were given a space to write their perspectives and opinions regarding IT disposal. Some of the issues that being written were the difficulties to get information about IT disposal, lacking of knowledge and awareness, lacking of support, insufficient nearby authorized collectors, and lacking of enforcement. These issues need to be solving in order to raise awareness
regarding IT disposal and e-waste among Malaysian [18]. In addition, they also acknowledged that they are willing to keep the obsolete and non-working IT device in their place rather than find the authorized collectors because of the lacking of licensed premise. As IT disposal was one of elements in Green IT, therefore the issues of IT disposal also reflex to the barrier to implement Green IT such as low of awareness, lacking of support, no guideline and no enforcement [19].
VI. ITASSET DISPOSAL PROCESS IN MALAYSIA.
Figure 6 shows the whole process of asset disposal in government sector which also include the IT asset disposal. However, based on the flowchart, there was no significant difference between IT asset and any other asset disposal in government sector.
Fig.6 : Flowchart of Asset Disposal in Government Sector [20].
In fact, the difference of IT asset disposal and any other asset disposal was the different form (KEW.PA) that being used to identify details of the asset. Thus, the process of IT asset disposal is not being highlight in the guideline as the process of disposal was hand over to license organization that handling e-waste.
As some issues regarding low awareness and lacking of guideline of e-waste and IT disposal was being discussed and mentioned by respondent, a guideline of IT asset disposal for consumer and end user should be developed in order to raise awareness about e-waste, IT disposal and Green IT among citizen. The drop off location for recycle IT equipment should be exposed to citizen through mass media or any digital advertisement through mobile phone in order to assist citizen to manage e-waste and conduct IT disposal.
Fig.7 : Flowchart of IT Asset Disposal for consumer.
Figure 7 shows the flowchart of IT asset disposal for consumer whereby the first step was identify any signal of broken, improper function or non-working equipment. Then, customer or end user needs to repair their IT equipment as much as possible. If the recover process was failed, another process should be conduct was refurbish by replacing into new hardware, components or upgrade system.
VII. CONCLUSION.
As a conclusion, e-waste including IT disposal was very important in an IT product lifecycle and improper e-waste management will create harmful effect to human, environment, flora and fauna. The awareness regarding Green IT, IT disposal and e-waste can be raised by conducting activities involving communities, students and citizen. Guideline and best practice of e-waste and IT disposal should be promoted among citizen in order to assist citizen implementing proper disposal of IT asset.
Then, regulation and enforcement regarding e-waste and IT disposal should be improved to ensure the implementation of proper e-waste. Awareness among students regarding e-waste and IT disposal were still at the beginner level and most of the students were still unaware with the existence of collector and procedure to dispose obsolete equipment. The drop-off location can be increased and built near to the housing area, and education institution area.
References
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