IPC International Community magazine an association member publication
Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1546580
42 I-CONNECT007 MAGAZINE I SEPTEMBER 2026 current example is many company policies on the proper disposal of laptop computers, where the success of the policy is measured by the number of computers collected and not by their actual recy- cling or proper disposal, which, as it turns out, typi- cally does not occur. The peril of unintended consequences! Exactly. There's an economic principle known as Goodhart's Law: When a measure becomes a tar- get, people naturally begin optimizing for the mea- sure rather than the underlying outcome. I think that's very relevant to electronics recy- cling. The next evolution should be moving from measuring what was collected or what was desig- nated for recycling toward verifying what actually happened to it. For us, the important question isn't simply whether a laptop was recorded as recycled. It's whether the data was irreversibly destroyed, whether the material avoided landfill and unnecessary export, what happened to the non-metal components, and whether the recovered metals genuinely returned to the circular economy. Are there some organizations doing valuable work in this space? Organizations such as the Basel Action Network (BAN) have done important investigative work in high- lighting what can happen to electronic waste once it enters complex downstream recycling channels. Their Brokers of Shame investigation, for example, used electronic tracking devices to follow mate- rial through the recycling chain and documented significant quantities of U.S. electronic waste being exported overseas. What I find particularly important about work like that is that the original owner may have acted entirely responsibly. They handed their equipment to someone believing it would be properly recycled. The problem is that once material passes through multiple intermediaries, visibility can quickly disappear. That brings us back to the distinction we discussed earlier between intention and outcome. An organi- zation can have every intention of recycling respon- sibly and still have very little ability to verify the ulti- mate outcome. Have these revelations affected trust with the av- erage citizen who wants to dispose of e-waste properly? They inevitably undermine confidence. Most people want to do the right thing; the problem is knowing whether what they were promised actually happened. I think the way you rebuild that confidence is through transparency, traceability, and verifiable outcomes. People shouldn't simply have to take our word for it. They should be able to understand what happened to their device and where the resulting materials ultimately went. What might that look like? That's really what we've tried to build at Xscindo. We operate a closed-loop process designed around a zero-landfill objective. The electronics we receive are processed at our facility, data- bearing components are irreversibly destroyed, and the non-metal fraction is thermally treated. The recovered metals are then directed into domestic refining and the U.S. circular economy. Everything else is basically disintegrated into a non-harmful gas—completely gone. Just as importantly, the process is documented. We want customers to have a clear chain of custody and evidence of the final outcome: proof rather than promise. Who does Xscindo partner with? We work with companies and institutions that need a secure and responsible solution for their end-of- life electronics. We also operate a community out- reach program, through which we allocate a portion of our processing capacity to community e-waste recovery. What's interesting is that we are increasingly working across the entire lifecycle, from organiza- tions looking for secure disposition of their equip- ment to landfill operators trying to prevent these materials from being buried in the first place. I am glad to hear Xscindo is actively working with landfills. Electronic waste accounts for 2% of landfill mass, yet it's responsible for over 70% of landfill toxicity.