Here are some shocking numbers. I warn you in advance that you will feel guilty, even if you are not a perpetrator.

In the year 2007, according to the EPA,  770,369 tons of televisions (that’s 1.5 billion pounds) were tossed into landfills. For every 100 televisions discarded that year, 82 were dumped in the trash.

That’s the bad news. Here’s the good news: for every 100 televisions discarded in 2007, 18 were recycled! That number is up from 2005, when only 15% were recycled.

By now you probably know that a television in a landfill is a bad thing. Beyond the weight and space that a discarded TV takes up, there are several toxins, including mercury, inside the screen that will pollute the ground.  Of course these billions of pounds of TVs are spread out in landfills across the country, so there’s a minimal accumulation of these toxins. But they are severe polluters none the less.

So, you have your eye on that new 80 inch plasma screen HDTV. But what do you do with that 27 inch Zenith in the living room now?  Here are some ideas:

If The TV Still Works

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• Donate it to a family member, like your starving nephew.
• Donate it to a charitable organization, like the Salvation Army (www.salvationarmyusa.org) or Goodwill Industries (www.goodwill.org). If you Google your favorite charity you can schedule for them to come and pick it up.
• See if the retailer that sells you your cool 80 inch plasma screen HDTD has a recycling program and will take your old TV with them.
•  Visit the web and take a look at www.earth911.com.  There you can type in your zip code and find a list of agencies and companies (I was surprised to see the Office Depot on the list) that will take your television and recycle it for you.

If The TV Doesn’t Work

• See if the retailer that’s selling you the new TV will take your old one and recycle it. If they don’t recycle it, don’t let them take it.  Remember that the goal is not to get rid of it, but to keep it out of the landfill.
• f the retailer won’t take it, or if they will simply dump it, visit www.earth911.com and find a nearby location to which you can take it. 

These same resources hold true for all electronics, including computers, printers, copiers, fax machines, multi-function devices, and cell phones.

There is one caveat you should remember before donating your computer: delete your documents.  Make sure you delete all of your documents and pictures from the hard drive of the computer you are donating. You can copy them to temporary drives or external hard drives, but you must be very careful to make sure nothing of YOU remains on your old computer. Leaving something, anything, that can connect you to that computer is the first step towards identity theft, and you’ve got to protect yourself. There. That’s the caveat.

You know, of course, that you shouldn’t be throwing out your used batteries, either.  You can use the same website, www.earth911.com, and you’ll see where you can take those. And don’t forget your compact fluorescent light bulbs, either.  Those shouldn’t go into the trash because, they, too, have mercury in them.

New technologies present outstanding opportunities to reduce energy consumption and waste. But they do present challenges in terms of what to do with the technology they obsolete. The answer is to use a very old technology (your head), and that emerging technology (the Internet) together to find the best choice.

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