Jianxin Yang

Estimation of retired mobile phones generation in China: A comparative study on methodology.

Due to the rapid development of economy and technology, China has the biggest production and possession of mobile phones around the world. In general, mobile phones have relatively short life time because the majority of users replace their mobile phones frequently. Retired mobile phones represent the most valuable electrical and electronic equipment (EEE) in the main waste stream because of such characteristics as large quantity, high reuse/recovery value and fast replacement frequency. Consequently, the huge amount of retired mobile phones in China calls for a sustainable management system. The generation estimation can provide fundamental information to construct the sustainable management system of retired mobile phones and other waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE). However, the reliable estimation result is difficult to get and verify. The priority aim of this paper is to provide proper estimation approach for the generation of retired mobile phones in China, by comparing some relevant methods. The results show that the sales&new method is in the highest priority in estimation of the retired mobile phones. The result of sales&new method shows that there are 47.92 million mobile phones retired in 2002, and it reached to 739.98 million in China in 2012. It presents an increasing tendency with some fluctuations clearly. Furthermore, some discussions on methodology, such as the selection of improper approach and error in the input data, are also conducted in order to improve generation estimation of retired mobile phones and other WEEE.

Environment consumption patterns of Chinese urban households and their policy implications

In the last two decades, sustainable consumption has become one of the most important issues in global sustainable development. Rapid economic development in China has greatly improved peoples living standards, but has also seriously damaged the environment. In this paper, material flow analysis and life-cycle assessment methods were used to analyze environmental consumption patterns of Chinese urban households. Results show that the total household environmental impact (HEI) increased nearly four fold, increasing from 1.85 in the environmental potential index (EPI) in 1985 to 6.40 EPI in 2000. In 1985 and 1990, more than 80% of HEI came from food and housing consumption behaviors. In 2000, transport and housing consumption behaviors have become the main sources of HEI. Climate, economic development, household income, family size, and urbanization rate are main driving forces of household environmental impacts. The increasing consumption demand in the next two decades and its environmental implications are discussed in the last part of this paper.

An updated review and conceptual model for optimizing WEEE management in China from a life cycle perspective

Waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) is a rapidly growing category of solid waste. China is now facing WEEE problems from both growing domestic generation and illegal imports. Currently, the amount of WEEE formally treated has increased steadily in China. The layout of the formal sector has been basically completed. Meanwhile, by controlling illegal disassembly activities, the informal sector has been gradually transformed to formal one. Beginning with the overview of the WEEE recycling industry in China, this paper first lists the latest progress in WEEE management from such aspects as the new edition of China RoHS Directive (Restriction of Hazardous Substances Directive), the updated WEEE Treatment List, the updated WEEE fund standard, the revised National Hazardous Waste List, and a brand-new plan on extended producer responsibility. In so doing, we elucidate the current challenges on WEEE management in detail: the imbalance between fund levies and subsidies, the gap in the supervision scope, the homogenization of recycling industry and the lack of life cycle approaches. Finally, a conceptual framework for integrated management of WEEE is proposed from a life cycle perspective. Overall, the life cycle management of WEEE includes three aspects: developing life cycle information for decision-making, implementing life cycle engineering with life cycle tools, and improving WEEE legislation based on life cycle thinking. By providing specific operating strategies, this life cycle framework should help to optimize WEEE management in developing countries where legislation is imperfect and the recycling system is relatively immature.

Exploring the life cycle management of industrial solid waste in the case of copper slag.

Industrial solid waste has potential impacts on soil, water and air quality, as well as human health, during its whole life stages. A framework for the life cycle management of industrial solid waste, which integrates the source reduction process, is presented and applied to copper slag management. Three management scenarios of copper slag are developed: (i) production of cement after electric furnace treatment, (ii) production of cement after flotation, and (iii) source reduction before the recycling process. A life cycle assessment is carried out to estimate the environmental burdens of these three scenarios. Life cycle assessment results showed that the environmental burdens of the three scenarios are 2710.09, 2061.19 and 2145.02 Pt respectively. In consideration of the closed-loop recycling process, the environmental performance of the flotation approach excelled that of the electric furnace approach. Additionally, although flash smelting promotes the source reduction of copper slag compared with bath smelting, it did not reduce the overall environmental burdens resulting from the complete copper slag management process. Moreover, it led to the shifting of environmental burdens from ecosystem quality damage and resources depletion to human health damage. The case study shows that it is necessary to integrate the generation process into the whole life cycle of industrial solid waste, and to make an integrated assessment for quantifying the contribution of source reduction, rather than to simply follow the priority of source reduction and the hierarchy of waste management.

Life Cycle Energy and Greenhouse Gas Emissions of Automobiles Using Aluminum in China

Transportation is a major part of energy consumption and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Aluminum (Al) as a light metal can reduce vehicle weight, energy consumption, and pollutant emissions, but Al production is energy intensive. The main contents of this study are the following: (1) create the life cycle inventory of Al parts based on the energy background in China and (2) evaluate the energy savings and GHG reduction for the vehicle when steel parts are replaced by Al parts. Although there is a considerable reduction in energy consumption of per tonne Al in China owing to continuing development of process technology in recent years, energy consumption is higher than the world average level and European level. Over the vehicles life cycle driving of 200,000 kilometers, the vehicle was found to avoid 1,447 to 1,590 liters of gasoline consumption when six typical steel parts were replaced by Al parts. Based on the current technology, the breakeven distance was calculated, resulting in a net energy benefit to use the lightweight Al parts compared with steel parts. A sensitivity analysis was conducted to show different energy savings by considering secondary weight reduction and different driving distance. The results indicate that weight reduction by using Al is quite effective to reduce the energy consumption and GHG of transportation.

Identification and assessment of environmental burdens of Chinese copper production from a life cycle perspective

The environmental burdens of Chinese copper production have been identified and quantified in the context of typical technologies, materials supplies and environmental emissions by a life cycle approach. Primary and secondary copper production using copper ores and scraps, respectively, were analyzed in detail. The flash and bath smelting approaches and the recycling of copper scraps were selected as representative copper production processes. A quantitative analysis was also conducted to assess the influence of material transport distance in copper production. Life cycle assessment (LCA) results showed that resources depletion and human health contribute significantly to environmental burdens in Chinese copper production. In addition, the secondary copper production has dramatically lower environmental burdens than the primary production. There is no obvious distinction in overall environmental burdens in primary copper production by flash or bath smelting approach. However, resources depletion is lower and the damage to human health is higher for flash smelting approach. Ecosystem quality damage is slight for both approaches. Environmental burdens from the mining stage contribute most in all life cycle stages in primary copper production. In secondary copper production, the electrolytic refining stage dominates. Based on the life cycle assessment results, some suggestions for improving environmental performance were proposed to meet the sustainable development of Chinese copper industry.

From Centralized Disassembly to Life Cycle Management: Status and Progress of E-waste Treatment System in China

China is now facing e-waste problems from both growing domestic generation and illegal imports. Many stakeholders are involved in the e-waste treatment system due to the complexity of e-waste life cycle. Beginning with the state of the e-waste treatment industry in China, this paper summarizes the latest progress in e-waste management from such aspects as the new edition of the China RoHS Directive, new Treatment List, new funding subsidy standard, and eco-design pilots. Thus, a conceptual model for life cycle management of e-waste is generalized. The operating procedure is to first identify the life cycle stages of the e-waste and extract the important life cycle information. Then, life cycle tools can be used to conduct a systematic analysis to help decide how to maximize the benefits from a series of life cycle engineering processes. Meanwhile, life cycle thinking is applied to improve the legislation relating to e-waste so as to continuously improve the sustainability of the e-waste treatment system. By providing an integrative framework, the life cycle management of e-waste should help to realize sustainable management of e-waste in developing countries.

Comparison on End-of-Life strategies of WEEE in China based on LCA

As the Electrical and Electronic Equipment (EEE) are upgraded more frequently in China, a large quantity of Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) was and will be generated. It becomes an urgent issue to develop and adopt an effective End-of-Life (EoL) strategy for EEE in order to balance the resource recovery and environmental impacts. In an EoL strategy hierarchy for EEE, reuse strategy is usually deemed to be prior to materials recovery and other strategies. But in practice, the advantages and disadvantages of different strategies are always context-dependent. Therefore, main EoL strategies for EEE in China need to be evaluated in environment and resources aspects from the life cycle perspective. In this study, the obsolete refrigerator and Power Supply Unit (PSU) of desktop PC are both taken as the target products. Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is applied to assess the environmental impacts of different EoL scenarios in China: Unit Reuse Scenario (URS), Component Reuse Scenario (CRS) and Materials Recovery Scenario (MRS). The LCA results show that the EoL strategies hierarchy is reasonable for the part of computer, but not necessarily suitable for obsolete refrigerators. When the policy makers promote or demote one EoL strategy especially reuse, it is necessary to take subsequent impacts into consideration.

A Cloud-Based Approach to Support the Mobile Phone Recycling Industry in China

In recent years, the waste mobile phones are generated in large quantity in China. Those e-wastes gain more and more attention because of both the sharp increase in quantity and the recyclable reso ...