Smart Parts offers WEEE recycling for your old laptop parts
oleg | 6:52 pm | July 31, 2010 | Green Laptops, Smart Parts
Along with the pleasure of having your own laptop comes the responsibility to dispose it in a proper, environmentally friendly way. The time when your AC adapter stops working or your laptop battery reaches the end of its life is inevitable and you are faced with the necessity to purchase a new one. That’s why Smart Parts is out there to offer you whether an original item or a generic replacement charger, depending on how much money you are willing to spend. However, what should you do with the old part after receiving the replacement? Should you just toss it out or there is a better alternative? With the stories about global warming and how landfills are filling up faster than the authorities can handle, “going green” sounds like a much better choice. If you own a notebook computer, you should know about the ways in which the old parts can be recycled before you head toward that rubbish bin.
Just before you decide to dispose your laptop spares, consider this list of products with hazardous materials inside:
1. LCD Screen
The screen is one of the most dangerous laptop parts to end up in a landfill. It often has such toxic materials as mercury, cadmium and chromium, all of which are hazardous to the environment. Flame-retardant materials used in the plastic also contain bromide, which in high dosages can cause neurological damage.
2. Power adapters
A recent study by Greenpeace reported that polyvinyl chloride (PVC) was found in 44 percent of all plastic cabling of the AC and car adapters. When incinerated, these release dioxins, which are known to increase the likelihood of cancer. Phthalates, which the EPA has found can cause damage to the liver and testes from long-term exposure, were also found in the cables examined by Greenpeace.
3. Laptop keyboard
A laptop keyboard is typically made of plastic with a little circuit board in it. While these aren’t worth a whole lot to recyclers, they are definitely something that you want to keep out of landfills as they’re nothing but big hunks of plastic and steel.
4. Laptop battery
Many older laptops used rechargeable nickel-cadmium (NiCa) batteries, which contain hazardous cadmium. Newer laptops, fortunately, are relying on newer types of batteries (lithium ion), which are not as hazardous, but nevertheless should be recycled properly.
One of our main goals as a laptop accessories seller and manufacturer is to respond to the challenges raised by climate change, environmental sustainability, and corporate responsibility. We have set up very easy to read information which is accessible from their main website. Starting from July this year Smart Parts has made arrangements for processing waste electronic equipment such as laptop batteries, AC and car adapters, LCD screens and laptop keyboards under the terms of the WEEE Regulations.
You can rest assured that while sending your old electronic appliances to us it will be recycled in accordance with the WEEE Directive. We will make sure that it will be processed in the UK by our carefully selected partners ensuring all hazardous materials are removed and dealt with according to current legislation. It may not seem like doing the right thing with one battery would make a difference. However, you must keep the big picture in mind. If each of our customers, both business and retail, would send their old components back to us, we as a company will be able to recycle thousands of the old units monthly while the only thing you should pay is the postage expenses. This is a great amount considering the ten to fifteen minutes it may take a person to dispose of the batteries in this way. You can even return your waste batteries to us in person or find your local recycling facility at www.recyclenow.com. Now most superstores and shops have collection bins for used batteries while some town halls, libraries and schools may also set up collection points.
You can send your old laptop parts to us to the address below:
WEEE Take-Back Scheme
Smart Parts
72 Farm Lane
London
SW6 1QA
Thank you.
Scientists can make laptop batteries from ink and paper
Alexandra | 5:15 am | January 19, 2010 | Laptop News
Scientists from Stanford University used nanotechnology to create ultra-lightweight, flexible batteries and supercapacitors from ordinary paper. They just covered a sheet of paper with ink comprising carbon nanotubes and silver nanowires. And as a result they got a new storage device that can be used for production of innovative power supplies (laptop batteries, chargers for mobile phones, electric vehicles, etc.).
Capacitors can hold their charge for smaller period of time compared to batteries, but they can also be charged much faster. Professor Yi Cui (Stanford researcher) claims that used nanomaterials contain structures with a very small diameter, allowing ink to attach to fibrous paper. So it makes the paper batteries resistant to wear. Moreover, they can be recharged about 40,000 times (it’s incommensurably more than corresponding characteristics of lithium-ion batteries).
Yi Cui tried to create an analogous storage device form plastic earlier. But his new study shows that paper-based solution has greater prospects. This battery can be crumpled, placed into liquids (even acidic solutions!) without any damage to its performance.
Calculations show that paper with a kilogram of ink can power a 40-watt bulb for about an hour. It’s not an impressive result, but you should take into account that scientists are running their first experiments now. Be sure, after a couple of years your laptop battery will be much thinner and lighter in weight, allowing you to enjoy liаe without chargers and AC adapters for days, not hours.
Pedal Charger – Use Laptop without Battery
Alexandra | 1:06 am | November 14, 2009 | Concept Laptops, Laptop News, USB Stuff
Sometimes technologies of the past help us to go in the future. Let’s take the first pedal powered machine for XO laptops as an example. Akmal Waak and Mike Dawson, technicians working for OLPC (the One Laptop Per Child Association, Inc.) in Afghanistan, have designed such a mechanism to charge XO laptops. Of course, it is made not just for fun or health improvement, this new prototype has noble mission, it allows to use OLPC gadgets in countryside and rural areas beyond the power grid.
Developers claim that their human power machine can be used without any difficulties even by children of 3rd and 4th graders. Users can run laptop and at the same time charge it, moreover it requires no additional batteries or special adapters.
Аbout 2,500 laptops were delivered in Kabul, Herat and Jalalabad schools. Now specialists of OLPC Afghanistan’s deployment analyze impact of these educational innovations and plan to create a new pedal charger of smaller size to provide more comfort and mobility.
Such mechanisms can be helpful not only in developing and least developed countries, but also in advanced economies. Why not? Among other kinds of energy given by sun’s rays or wind we can rely on simple pedal power. And some producers have already done it. So a company from China has put on the market its Рedal Powered LED Spotlight Combo Contraption, new charger for gadgets with a USB port.
