Title: The Burning Truth Behind an E-Waste Dump in Africa  | Science   | Smithsonian Magazine
Headings: The Burning Truth Behind an E-Waste Dump in Africa
The Burning Truth Behind an E-Waste Dump in Africa
Ending the toxic smoke rising from an iconic dump in Ghana will take more than curbing Western waste
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Content: Later, workers will gather up the steel left behind. Elsewhere, around 40 men, most in their teens and early 20s, tend five- and ten-pound bundles of burning insulated copper wire. They contain everything from harness wires used in automobiles to USB cables. In Ghana and across the world, insulated wire is highly sought by recyclers big and small, who covet the metal but not the insulation. The task of the recycler is to separate the two substances as quickly and economically as possible. In the course of a day, perhaps a few hundred pounds of wire are burned, with the remains sold for recycling to local metal dealers and Nigerian traders who frequent the area. Depending on when the insulation was made, the smoke emitted can contain dioxin, heavy metals and other pollutants that pose a strong threat to human health. Over the last half century, technologies have been developed to do that separation in an environmentally sound manner. But even the lowest-cost solutions tend to be too expensive for Ghana’s capital-poor recyclers. And if they were affordable, green methods would still be too slow compared to setting the wire on fire and burning off the insulation.