Repsol YPF

The large volume of dangerous waste produced by these phones and their accessories have prompted various public and private recycling initiatives over the past few years.

Tragamovil: the most popular
This pioneering project was formulated by the Asociación Multisectorial de Empresas Españolas de Electrónica y Comunicaciones (ASIMELEC). Under the slogan: Don't chuck me, recycle me a pilot initiative was started, which by the end of 2004 had collected and treated some 175,000 kilos of mobile phones and their parts.

The Tragamovil initiative set up specific collection points all over Spain, helping ASIMELEC to collect over 53,000 kilos of mobiles and their parts between January and September 2004. The association calculates the cost of recycling a mobile phone at 0.09 euros, and stresses that 90% of its parts can be recycled.

In addition to collecting, reusing (wherever possible) and destroying these phones in a controlled manner, the campaign also aims to educate users on the importance of recycling phones, since many are left in drawers or cupboards back home.

The problem is that in most cases faulty telephones are discarded at the first opportunity without even attempting a repair job. The reason is that it is often cheaper to buy a new one than get your old one fixed.

Charitable phones
The second most important Spanish project arose in 2003 under the steam of the charity Entreculturas, who joined up with the Red Cross to put into action www.donatumovil.org.

The aim of the campaign entitled Place your mobile where it is most needed is to collect the phones that are no longer used for recycling purposes and to donate the resulting profits to education and development programs for the needy. It also aims to educate the population on the importance of protecting and taking care of the environment.

In order to collaborate with Entreculturas and the Red Cross you simply have to deposit your old phone and its parts into any of the 3,500 special containers located all over Spain, usually in participating supermarkets and shops.

How to act?
In this case, the logistics of collecting, recycling and processing of the units is carried out by CMR (Corporate Mobile Recycling Ltd.), which recycles faulty mobiles according to environmental and dangerous waste treatment guidelines. If the phones can be repaired, they are resold at market price and the profits used to fund projects by Entreculturas and the Red Cross. Many of these phones are sold in third world countries where mobiles are an excellent alternative to expensive and unreliable landlines.