clipped from www.cnn.com

SAN FRANCISCO, California (AP) — Most Americans think they’re helping the earth when they recycle their old computers, televisions and cell phones. But chances are they’re contributing to a global trade in electronic trash that endangers workers and pollutes the environment overseas.

“It is being recycled, but it’s being recycled in the most horrific way you can imagine,” said Jim Puckett of the Basel Action Network, the Seattle-based environmental group that tipped off Hong Kong authorities. “We’re preserving our own environment, but contaminating the rest of the world.”

Eight states, including five this year, have passed such laws, and companies such as Apple, Dell, Hewlett-Packard and Sony now take back their products at no charge. Some require consumers to mail in their old gear, while others have drop-off centers. HP says it also now designs its equipment with fewer toxic materials and has made it easier to recycle.

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Personally, I do agonize a bit about where my electronic junk is going, thus it sits in my office. The real key here is what HP is doing with making it easier to recycle their products. The nature of technology makes it hard to buy an item with the notion that it won’t be surpassed in a relatively small number of years. You can’t just buy less often with some technology. It’s not realistic. You need to address the problem from a different angle and make what you’re selling more easily turned into something else once its usefulness has ended.