Earth Gauge: Make the Call

Each year, less than 20 percent of unwanted cell phones are recycled, despite the fact that cell-phone recycling has big environmental benefits. When you recycle your phone instead of tossing it in the trash, you keep valuable reusable materials out of the landfill, prevent air and water pollution, save energy and materials needed to make new products, and reduce emissions. As a matter of fact, recycling the 100 million cell phones in the U.S. that are at the end of their lives would save enough energy to power over 194,000 homes for one year. If those 100 million cell phones were re-used, we'd save enough energy to power 370,000 homes for one year!

Instead of throwing an old cell phone out or letting it sit in storage, recycle it. Precious metals, plastics, and copper from the phones can be recovered, and phones in working order may be donated to charitable organizations who can re-use them. The U.S. EPA has partnered with a number of retailers and service providers - AT&T Wireless, Best Buy, LG, Motorola, Nokia, Office Depot, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, Sprint, Staples, and T-Mobile - to offer cell phone recycling.

For the list of retailers and service providers that offer drop-off or mail-in cell phone recycling, visit EPA's "Plug-In to E-Cycling" Website: http://www.epa.gov/cellphone/cell-recycling-locations.htm

(Sources: U.S. EPA Office of Solid Waste and Emergency Response. "Cell Phone Recycling is an Easy Call." http://yosemite.epa.gov/opa/admpress.nsf/names/hq_2008-1-8_cells_phones)