During the run-up to the November 12 release of my first book, Junkyard Planet: Travels in the Billion Dollar Trash Trade, every weekday I’m posting a new photo taken during my decade of reporting on the global waste, recycling, refurbishment, and repair trade. Today’s scene shows workers in Sichuan Province dismantling small television monitors inside of one of China’s newest, and most environmentally-secure, recycling facilities. Click to enlarge.
In this image, taken during summer 2013, two workers are busy at a recycling factory capable of dismantling and recycling as many as 8000 televisions per day. Unlike the informal Chinese television dismantling factories of the past, this one is environmentally secure, the workers are afforded safety protection, and the salaries are generous (as much $800/month). But for all of those advantages, there’s no changing the simple fact that extracting as much recyclable material – and value – from an old television is hard, sometimes unpleasant, and often boring work. For those who like to think of recycling as a process whereby the consumer drops a television into a recycling bin that automatically transports it to Green Heaven, this can be a rude surprise. There is no Green Heaven, and there is no recycling process that ensures workers avoid tedium, menial jobs, and the sense that maybe this isn’t about making the world better, after all. And that goes for recycling business in Europe and the United States, just as much as it does for China.
Previous ‘Scenes from a Junkyard Planet’ can be found here.