E-Scrap News Article: e-Stewards Refurbishment Stance is Deeply Flawed by Robin Ingenthron

10 views
Skip to first unread message

Jim Lynch

unread,
Dec 22, 2009, 3:58:25 PM12/22/09
to refurbishers
Just thought I’d report in that the electronics recycling trade
publication, E-Scrap News, just came out and has a full article
entitled: Talking Points: e-Stewards Refurbishment Stance is Deeply
Flawed. It’s by Robin Ingenthron, This will likely cause a stir in the
industry.

I couldn't find a version of the article online, but here's Robin's
blog post about the topic:
http://retroworks.blogspot.com/2009/09/r2-and-rios-versus-e-stewards-ewaste.html

-jim

Jim Lynch

unread,
Dec 23, 2009, 2:06:04 PM12/23/09
to refurbishers
... and the beat goes on. Find the Basel Action rebuttal to Robin at:
http://www.e-Stewards.org/documents/GoodpointFalseClaims.pdf

Also in the December issue of E-Scrap News, there's an article by Josh
Lepawsky of Memorial University in Newfoundland called "Tracking E-
Scrap On The Grey Market". Among other things, his finding is that
that vast majority or e-waste flows are within regions, for instance,
over 90% of the e-waste trade in and around Asia (including China) is
with other Asian countries - not the US and Europe. Essentially the
substantial portion of E-Waste trade is between developing countries
and is not predominantly rich countries dumping on poor ones.

This is the first science based study on e-waste flows that I've seen.

-jim

> blog post about the topic:http://retroworks.blogspot.com/2009/09/r2-and-rios-versus-e-stewards-...
>
> -jim

Jim Puckett

unread,
Dec 23, 2009, 3:31:46 PM12/23/09
to refurbishers
Dear Jim and the Refurbishment Legions:

Thanks for letting me into the room here. Yes. Well, Robin's article
was deeply flawed and really quite the slam piece on e-Stewards.
Needless to say we at BAN were not very happy with Robin. We have
been promised rebuttals by e-Scrap News and they have put one forward
quickly in their newsletter. Robin and I have exchanged notes since
the publishing of this piece and he has admitted to me that he knew
nothing of the MPPI Guidance Document on Transboundary Movement of
Mobile Phones which has been adopted by the Parties of Basel and has a
great bearing on how the countries of the world see this issue with
respect to Basel Convention application. It is not BAN's
interpretation but that of 172 Parties. We simply wrote up the e-
Stewards standard to be compliant with the Basel Convention and the
Parties interpretation of it.

Robin also admitted he did not understand our membership. (Currently
we have 41 licensed e-Steward Recyclers that are audited to the older
pledge and are in queue for the newer more comprehensive
certification). Robin thought that our founders (14 funders of the
program) were the e-Steward Recyclers. There were many many more
errors in Robin's list of "flaws". Well if it is flawed to uphold
international law well we plead guilty.

When it comes down to it the only reason Robin has not been able to be
an e-Steward (which he wants to become), is that he is unwilling to
remove circuit boards prior to export that he knows are going to be
discarded when he ships to the semi-knock down market. Circuit boards
are haz. waste, and thus if they are going to be discarded we have haz
waste trade. If those boards were to be reused then no problem.

If refurbishers want to be sure that they are not contributing to
illegal trafficking in hazardous waste they should really consider
becoming an e-Steward. R2 will not do it for them. Among our 41 e-
Stewards currently, many are involved in refurbishing/asset
recovery. And contrary to nonsense emanating from ISRI, our license
and marketing fee (which includes massive promotion in mainstream and
trade press) is very very small for small players like most
refurbishers are (see: http://www.e-stewards.org/documents/e-Stewards_Marketing_and_Licensing_Fee_Schedule.xls)
It is so worth it to be part of the program. What you might lose in
business by being compliant with international law, you will more than
make up, in additional business coming in the front door.

Thanks for posting the link to our rebuttal to Robin below. But also
here is the piece e-Scrap Newsletter published so far to begin to set
the record straight.

Thanks, Jim......

1 | BAN refutes claims by Good Point Recycling

The Basel Action Network (BAN) took issue with many claims made in an
opinion piece published in the December's issue of E-Scrap News,
authored by Good Point Recycling and American Retroworks owner and
CEO, and fervent re-use advocate, Robin Ingenthron, calling them
"false and damaging to our integrity." In his Talking Points piece,
Ingenthron, who is also the founder of The World Reuse, Repair and
Recycling Association (WR3A), raised his concerns about the effect
BAN's e-Stewards certification program would have on refurbishment.

BAN's executive director, Jim Puckett, noted that the editorial had
several factual inaccuracies, and says Ingenthron admitted to them in
a series of communications with BAN. "Mr. Ingenthron admitted to BAN,
after publication, that he had not understood the membership of the e-
Stewards recyclers he reviewed in his article," says Puckett. "He
confused the list of 41 licensed recyclers with the 14 e-Steward
Founders that helped fund the program."

At the time of his writing, Ingenthron was not yet aware of the latest
clarifications by convention stakeholders with regard to exports of e-
waste for repair. "Robin admitted he knew nothing of the Guideline on
Transboundary Movement produced by the Mobile Phone Partnership
Initiative (MPPI) of the Basel Convention," says Puckett, "and he
accused BAN of creating its own interpretation of the Convention."

"The truth is Robin has been trotting out his own very self-serving
interpretation of the Basel Convention," Puckett continued, "unaware
that the Basel Parties have carefully examined the issue and created
guidelines that refute his notion that export for repair is outside of
the Convention."

In clarifying the MPPI Guideline negotiations, Puckett says that all
of the Basel Parties at the table agreed that whenever an export takes
place for repair and hazardous parts are discarded during repair, then
they fall under the Convention. BAN incorporated that guidance now
adopted by 172 countries into the e-Steward Standard.

In one particularly contentious part of his original Talking Points
editorial, Ingenthron accused BAN of being responsible for Malaysia's
decision last year to prohibit importation of U.S. CRT glass. Puckett
contests that claim, making available a letter which shows that he had
instead offered Malaysia a legal way to continue such import, but
Malaysia refused to accept it.

"Robin is a re-use crusader and that's responsible and we respect
that," says Puckett. "But, at the same time, he refuses to accept the
international rules of the road, and that is not responsible and we
cannot respect that."

For a complete list of BAN concerns with Robin Ingenthron's Talking
Points opinion piece: www.e-Stewards.org/documents/GoodpointFalseClaims.pdf.

More information from Ingenthron's perspective can be found on his
blog, Good Point Ideas Blog.

On Dec 22, 12:58 pm, Jim Lynch <jly...@techsoupglobal.org> wrote:

> blog post about the topic:http://retroworks.blogspot.com/2009/09/r2-and-rios-versus-e-stewards-...
>
> -jim

Jim Puckett

unread,
Dec 23, 2009, 3:43:18 PM12/23/09
to refurbishers
Dear Jim et al:

Before you take this article seriously we beg you to note that this
article is really laughable from a research standpoint as it admits at
the outset that they did not have any data on e-waste nor on illegal
trade in e-waste but rather on used batteries exported by companies
that have actually filled out the manifest truthfully. This source
of data is but a tiny fraction of the problem and hardly
representative of it. There is a reason nobody has dared publish an
article purporting to know and understand the trade flows of e-
waste. Its because the data does NOT exist. The waste trade that is
causing horrors around the world is primarily NOT used batteries that
are recorded as such in one single tariff code for batteries. What is
being traded is in fact primarily everything the article admits they
don't look at -- CPUs, CRTs, Circuit Boards and illegal shipments!
Hello! They admit they are not studying the problem that BAN has
exposed and the whole world is talking about in the text but then the
title of the piece and its inclusion imply that they looked at
everything. Further they purported to do on the ground research.
Sounds good right. But they chose two countries -- Kenya and
Bangladesh -- two countries I have visited andhave personally
researched with respect to e-waste imports and neither of these two
countries are receiving significant flows of imported waste. So
drawing conclusions from this very myopic view is simply misguided and
intellectually dishonest. We further expect a chance to seriously
counter this article. It is misleading in the extreme as it purports
to understand an elephant by studying its toenail.

yurs, Jim

Angela Haas

unread,
Dec 23, 2009, 6:56:47 PM12/23/09
to refurb...@googlegroups.com
WITS has been trying for 4 years to become and esteward, we signed the pledge have sent numerous amounts of emails. Always to be told they are backlogged. Its not fair to not list those of us who are recyclers and cant get what we need to become estewards.
If we are certified by our state or the EPA. that should count too I would think.


WITS
647 E Holly
Saint Louis MO 63147
314-382-1650
or
1017 Griggs St
Danville Il 61832

Http://witsinc.org


"Thank you for helping help us bridge the digital divide and save our Mother Earth"

Thanks, Jim......

--

You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "refurbishers" group.
To post to this group, send email to refurb...@googlegroups.com.
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to refurbishers...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/refurbishers?hl=en.

winmail.dat

WR3A Robin

unread,
Dec 27, 2009, 2:20:39 AM12/27/09
to refurbishers
Jim states, that the circuit board in describing our process, that in
the country-permitted, factory takeback, ISO14001, ISO9000, R2
standard compliant, independently audited, computer monitor
refurbisher, which has 4 inspections per year from their nation's EPA,
is discarding circuit boards after refurbishing.

This is completely false. We have provided BAN our attestation, and
independent audit, that any parts removed in the process are recycled
properly at another ISO facility. Jim has never asked whether the
facility which our partner sends the boards to is in an OECD
country.

The MPPI Chairman's letter, which Willie correctly describes, states
that if the removed parts are recycled back at an OECD country that
the practice should be considered compliant.

Because some refurbishers overseas discard parts does not mean either
A) All refurbishers discard parts, nor B) that the ones who are
discarding parts will continue to do so if given a Fair Trade
alternative (offered a better price in return for better practices).
The perfect should not be the enemy of the good.

Read the treaties. The Ayatollah is not wearing any robes.

Robin

There is lots more wrong in Jim's email.

Robin

> refurbishers are (see:http://www.e-stewards.org/documents/e-Stewards_Marketing_and_Licensin...)

Willie Cade

unread,
Dec 28, 2009, 4:30:38 PM12/28/09
to refurb...@googlegroups.com
Refurbishers,

My goal with this response is to take the hyperbole out of the conversation.
Before I go further I will admit that my bias in this issue is that
reuse/refurbishment is an overwhelmingly better alternative when talking
about e-waste. Of course reuse/refurbishment is not perfect but I don't
think we should make perfect the enemy of good.

In Jim's first paragraph of his response he talked about the "MPPI Guidance
Document on Transboundary Movement of Mobile Phones." This document was
produced a last year While international discussions under the Basel
Convention were being held about what to do with the mobile phones. There
are now other international discussions under the Basel Convention on what
to do with computer equipment which are called the Partnership for Action on
Computer Equipment or PACE. The thing to know about the whole MPPI process
is that there are 11 specific issues that the most involved participants
acknowledge need clarification, in other words there are some gray areas on
this subject. These issues are noted in something called the Chairman's
paper. I will not go into the specifics at this time but just suffice it to
say good people who are committed to this issue have differences of opinions
on the subject. Given that there are real issues on this subject I would
categorize the phrase "We simply wrote up the e-Stewards standard to be


compliant with the Basel Convention and the Parties interpretation of it

(Basel Convention)." as hyperbole. I think it is more accurate to say
e-Stewards represents BAN's interpretation of the Basel Convention.

In Jim's fourth paragraph he comments about "illegal trafficking in
hazardous waste" that the Responsible Recycling (R2) standards, ". . . will
not do it for them." His inference that if a refurbisher adopts and abides
by the R2 standard that they will be doing something illegal is inaccurate.
This is his opinion. I have been assured by both government and industry
experts that R2 will indeed meet legal responsibilities.

Willie Cade

Willie Cade
 
Our warehouse address is 3053 N Knox, Chicago, IL 60641
Voice 773-545-7575  Fax 773-545-7502

www.pcrr.com


-----Original Message-----
From: refurb...@googlegroups.com [mailto:refurb...@googlegroups.com]
On Behalf Of Jim Puckett
Sent: Wednesday, December 23, 2009 2:32 PM
To: refurbishers

Thanks, Jim......

Reply all
Reply to author
Forward
0 new messages