I’m not proud of the fact that I have eight old mobile phones in a drawer of a filing cabinet in my home office. Admittedly, they constitute a family repository but when you add in one old laptop and two unused desktop computers, that’s a lot of rare-earth minerals in one room of an average family home.
Mobile and smartphones are not even the most hoarded small consumer electronic devices in European households, according to the Waste from Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) Forum, an international association of more than 50 producer-responsibility organisations. Headphones, remote controls, clocks, irons, external hard drives, routers, keyboards and computer mice all come in ahead of them.
In its survey, the WEEE Forum found that possible reuse, plans to sell or give away and sentimental value were the three top reasons why people hoarded electronic equipment.
“We like to hold on to things that we perceive have value, particularly if they don’t take up too much space. But this doesn’t help you or the planet,” says Elizabeth O’Reilly, head of environmental compliance at WEEE Ireland. WEEE Ireland collects electrical and electronic items for recycling from civic amenity sites and retailers as part of an EU compliance scheme.
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O’Reilly believes that Ireland is on the cusp of change when it comes to initiatives to promote reuse, repair and trade-in of small electronic items such as mobile phones.
“The European Commission is aware that most of the rare-earth minerals used in smartphones are geographically controlled outside of Europe and it now wants to get 25 per cent of strategic and critical rare-earth minerals from recycled content in Europe,” she says. Strategic materials include steel, and while lithium is also a valuable metal.
Waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) is the fastest-growing waste stream in Europe, according to an Environmental Protection Agency-funded research paper. That 2021 study found that frugality and waste avoidance were the overwhelming drivers for consumers to store electrical equipment that was no longer in use.
“A lack of connection between long-term storage and pressure on virgin raw material extraction means this is likely to persist,” wrote Yvonne Ryan-Fogarty and others in An Investigation into WEEE Arising and Not Arising in Ireland.
A period of home renovation is deemed to be a critical moment for the disposal of WEEE from householders.
The study suggested that the convenience and visibility of WEEE recycling needed to be increased. More repair, preparation for reuse and reuse opportunities would assist consumers and businesses to make connections to appropriate treatment rather than waste avoidance, which is the current practice, according to the researchers.
A 2013 report by the UK environmental charity Green Alliance claimed that a reused iPhone retained 48 per cent of its value while the value of a recycled iPhone came in at less than 1 per cent (0.24 per cent). And the production of a new smartphone is responsible for about 85 per cent of the device’s total lifetime carbon footprint.
More recent initiatives such as Apple Trade In, Swappie and Refurbed.ie all offer money back on recent iPhone models, which incentivises reuse. The chain of CeX shops around Ireland also buys recent models of smartphones in good condition. Other older models – such as most of the ones in my drawer – are only fit for recycling, however.
Buying second-hand smartphones is also getting easier with sites such as Refurbed.ie offering customers 30-day free trials before committing to purchasing refurbished phones. Each refurbished product also has a 12-month warranty.
However, offering consumers clear information where to drop off or send old devices for reuse rather than recycling is a necessary first step to building up this second-hand marketplace. Assuring customers that their devices will be forensically wiped of all data is also essential before such devices are prepared for resale.
“People aren’t afraid to buy second-, third- or fourth-hand cars but we need a registration system for reuse operators of electronic equipment that can be shared with the public,” says O’Reilly.
O’Reilly also believes that customers should be informed at the point of sale about where they can go for repairs and where they can trade in their electronic products for reuse or recycling.
“Manufacturers are obliged to include a repair sheet and an extended warranty under the EU Directive on Repair of Goods,” she says. “We need this information digitally available to consumers when they are buying their phones.”
The National Centre for the Circular Economy at the Rediscovery Centre in Ballymun, Dublin is planning to launch a new citizen information platform (circular.ie) later this year, which is expected to have links to repair centres for almost everything, including small electronic devices. Already, the countrywide online directory Repairmystuff.ie allows electronic equipment repair shops list their services for free, although there are no quality checks on the businesses that list on the site.
There is also no Irish data on what percentage of smartphones and other electronic devices are repaired and refurbished in Ireland. A Swappie.com report in 2024 estimated that about 10 per cent of the European smartphone market – whose total value was estimated at €100 billion – consisted of refurbished devices.
We need advertising campaigns encouraging people in the public and private sector to consider refurbished and remanufactured devices instead of buying new
— Anthony O’Dea
Anthony O’Dea, commercial director of Green IT, a company that refurbishes and remanufactures IT equipment for businesses, the public sector and charities, says there has been a lack of trust of products due to fears over outdated operating systems. “Yet there is a growing market driven by legitimate customer interest – particularly in the education sector,” says O’Dea.
Under the Government’s Green Public Procurement scheme, Green IT signed a €30 million contract in May 2024 to supply 60,000 laptops over four years. “This will represent 12 per cent of public-sector end users and is the only contract of its size and type in the EU,” says O’Dea.
Such contracts may bring momentum to the reuse of electronic equipment across the corporate and consumer sectors. O’Reilly says: “The second whole of Government circular economy strategy – which is due very soon – will be the clearest blueprint yet to drive repair, reuse and remanufacturing.”
O’Dea adds that compliance schemes such as WEEE Ireland also need to promote reuse more. “We need advertising campaigns encouraging people in the public and private sector to consider refurbished and remanufactured devices instead of buying new,” he says.
A new training scheme for technicians who can repair consumer electronic goods due to start in the autumn of 2025 should help expand the second-hand market. “The key to having more trained workers is that there will be a quality standard and that consumers won’t be afraid to ask can their electronic device be repaired and trust that it will be repaired correctly,” says O’Reilly.
