More e-waste must be recycled, study finds

The recycling of e-waste must urgently be increased because mining the Earth for metals to make new gadgets is unsustainable, scientists have said. A new campaign run by The Royal Society of Chemistry is drawing attention to the unsustainability of continuing to mine for materials used in consumer technology. One study estimated that the world’s mountain of discarded electronics, in 2021 alone weighed 57 million tonnes, more than the Great Wall of China. The society says there now needs to be a global effort to mine that waste, rather than mining the Earth.