Biodiversity & Environment
Sustainable E-Waste Management Strategies
- 04 Oct 2025
- 10 min read
For Prelims: E-waste, Heavy Metals, Particulate Matter, DNA, Extended Producer Responsibility, Central Pollution Control Board, Blockchain, Right-to-Repair.
For Mains: E-Waste Management in India: Current Status, Challenges, Socio-Economic Impacts, Policy Initiatives, and Way Forward.
Why in News?
India generated 2.2 million metric tonnes (MT) of e-waste in 2025, becoming the third-largest global generator after China and the US. However, informal recycling exposes millions, especially marginalised communities, to serious health risks, making it a major urban challenge.
E- Waste
- About: E-waste, or electronic waste, refers to discarded or end-of-life electronic devices and equipment. It includes items such as computers, televisions, mobile phones, printers, refrigerators, and air conditioners.
- These products often contain toxic substances like lead, mercury, cadmium, and chromium.
- Current Status of E-waste in India:
- Rapid Growth: E-waste generation recorded a 150% surge from the 0.71 million MT recorded in 2017–18. At current rates, this volume is expected to nearly double by 2030 in India.
- Urban Hotspots: The crisis is concentrated in cities, with over 60% of e-waste originating from just 65 urban centers. Key hotspots include Seelampur and Mustafabad in Delhi, Moradabad in Uttar Pradesh, and Bhiwandi in Maharashtra.
- Informal Recycling: India has 322 registered formal recycling units with a capacity of 2.2 million MT annually, yet over half of e-waste (43% officially processed in 2023–24) is processed informally or not recycled.
- E-waste Management Frameworks in India
- E-Waste (Management) Rules, 2016: It introduced the concept of a Producer Responsibility Organization (PRO).
- E-Waste (Management) Rules 2022: Under Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR), producers must meet annual recycling targets through registered recyclers, with EPR certificates ensuring accountability for recycled products.
- Public institutions must dispose of e-waste through registered recyclers/refurbishers, who handle collection and processing.
- E-Waste (Management) Second Amendment Rules, 2023: Under Rule 5 of the E-Waste (Management) Rules 2022, Clause 4 was added to ensure safe and sustainable management of refrigerants in refrigeration and air-conditioning manufacturing.
- E-Waste (Management) Amendment Rules, 2024: The rules provide for the creation of platforms for trading EPR certificates as per Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) guidelines with its approval.
- The CPCB will set the EPR certificate price range between 30% (minimum) and 100% (maximum) of the environmental compensation for non-compliance.
- Hazardous and Other Wastes (Management and Transboundary Movement) Amendment Rules, 2025: It introduces a comprehensive EPR framework for non-ferrous metal scrap, making producers responsible for recycling targets rising from 10% in 2026-27 to 75% by 2032-33.
What are the Key Challenges Associated with Managing E-waste in India?
- Dominance of the Informal Sector: Over 50% of e-waste is managed by the informal sector, which uses hazardous methods like open-air burning, and acid leaching causing serious health and environmental impacts.
- Weak Implementation: EPR non-compliance, false reporting (fake certificates), and weak penalties fail to deter large corporations.
- Inadequate Infrastructure: Insufficient authorized dismantlers and recyclers, lack of advanced technologies for precious metal recovery, and the high cost of formal recycling limit India’s e-waste management capacity.
- Lack of Consumer Awareness: Most citizens lack awareness of e-waste hazards, often mixing it with municipal waste, while formal collection systems like producer take-back or drop-off points remain little known and inaccessible.
- Complex Nature of E-Waste: E-waste contains valuable metals (gold, copper), toxic heavy metals (lead, mercury), and hazardous chemicals, while modern compact device designs with glued or soldered parts make safe dismantling labor-intensive and difficult.
How Does E-Waste Impact the Environment and Human Health?
- Health Impacts: Informal e-waste recycling exposes workers and nearby populations to respiratory illnesses, neurological damage, skin, and eye disorders, and genetic impacts like DNA damage and immune alterations.
- Impacts on the Environment: Open burning releases particulate matter, heavy metals, and dioxins, creating hazardous air pollution; meanwhile, toxic slurries contaminate groundwater, threatening drinking and irrigation sources.
- Impact on Agriculture: Leaching from e-waste turns soil into a sink for heavy metals (cadmium, lead, chromium), which are absorbed by crops and livestock, while chemical contamination harms soil microbiota, reduces organic matter, and alters soil pH.
- Socio-Economic Impacts: Hazardous low-cost informal recycling hinders formal green industry growth, while improper handling of data storage devices risks fraud and identity theft.
How can India Make E-waste Management More Sustainable and Efficient?
- Formal Integration of the Informal Sector: Train informal e-waste workers as Green Collar technicians, provide safe recycling zones with protective gear and link formal registration to healthcare, insurance, and pension benefits.
- Use a blockchain-style digital ledger to track e-waste from consumers to recyclers, mandate annual audits, and streamline the EPR framework to ensure accountability.
- Leveraging Technology & Innovation: Fund R&D for advanced shredding, bioleaching, and non-thermal recovery methods; establish decentralized recycling hubs, and incentivize “urban mining” by treating e-waste as a valuable resource.
- Fostering Consumer Responsibility: Run campaigns on the health impacts of informal recycling and proper e-waste disposal; teach e-waste and circular economy in schools; and simplify disposal via producer take-back and reverse vending machines with incentives.
- Circular Economy: Promote Right-to-Repair laws, encourage durable and easily disassembled electronics through incentives, and support green public procurement by prioritizing repairable and recycled-content products.
- Global Collaboration: Strictly enforce the Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and Their Disposal (1989), a global treaty aimed at limiting the international movement of hazardous waste, including e-waste. India is a signatory to this convention.
Conclusion
India’s booming digital transformation has intensified its e-waste crisis, disproportionately affecting marginalized communities. Sustainable solutions require formalising the informal sector, strengthening enforcement, leveraging technology, promoting consumer responsibility, and embracing circular economy principles. Urgent multi-stakeholder action is essential to safeguard public health, environmental integrity, and long-term economic resilience.
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Drishti Mains Question: "India's digital leap has an unintended consequence: a silent e-waste epidemic." Critically examine this statement, analyzing the socio-economic and environmental challenges posed by informal e-waste recycling in urban India. |
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
1. What is India’s current e-waste generation status?
India generated 2.2 million MT of e-waste in 2025, ranking third globally, with urban hotspots like Delhi, Moradabad, and Bhiwandi contributing over 60%.
2. What is the concept of 'urban mining' in the context of e-waste management?
It treats e-waste as a valuable resource by recovering precious and rare-earth metals from discarded electronics, promoting a circular economy and reducing the need for virgin material extraction.
3. What are the major health risks associated with informal e-waste recycling?
Informal recycling exposes workers to respiratory illnesses, neurological damage, skin disorders, DNA damage, and developmental delays, especially in children.
UPSC Civil Services Examination, Previous Year Questions
Prelims:
Q. Due to improper/indiscriminate disposal of old and used computers or their parts, which of the following are released into the environment as e-waste? (2013)
- Beryllium
- Cadmium
- Chromium
- Heptachlor
- Mercury
- Lead
- Plutonium
Select the correct answer using the codes given below:
(a) 1, 3, 4, 6 and 7 only
(b) 1, 2, 3, 5 and 6 only
(c) 2, 4, 5 and 7 only
(d) 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7
Ans: (b)
Mains:
Q. What are the impediments in disposing of the huge quantities of discarded solid waste which are continuously being generated? How do we safely remove the toxic wastes that have been accumulating in our habitable environment? (2018)
