Simulating the Dynamics of E-waste Production from Mobile Phone: Model Development and Case Study of Rwanda

Type Journal Article - Journal of Environmental Accounting and Management
Title Simulating the Dynamics of E-waste Production from Mobile Phone: Model Development and Case Study of Rwanda
Author(s)
Volume 3
Issue 4
Publication (Day/Month/Year) 2015
Page numbers 309-322
Abstract
Mobile phone sales and stocks showed an exponential growth in the past
years globally and the annual number of mobile phones produced
surpassed one billion in 2007. This soaring growth of related e-waste
deserves sufficient attentions paid to it regionally and globally, since 40%
of its total weight is made from metallic, of which 12 elements are
identified to be highly hazardous. Different methods from different part
of the world have been used to estimate the obsolete mobile phones but
none has developed a dynamic model and handled the discrepancy
resulting from improper approach and error in the input data. This study
aimed to develop a comprehensive dynamic system model for simulating
the dynamism of e-waste production from mobile phone specifically for
African developing countries and to prevail over the previous errors. The
logistic model method combined with Stella program were used to carry
out this study. Then the simulation for Rwanda was conducted and
compared with others countries’ results as model testing and validation.
The results showed that Rwanda produced about 1.5 million obsolete
mobile phones with 125 tons of waste in 2014 and e-waste production
peak would appear in 2017. It is expected to reach 4.2 million obsoletes
with 352 tons by 2020 along with environmental impact intensity of 21
times of 2005. Moreover, e-waste management policy for developing
countries specifically for Rwanda has been suggested to reduce
environmental impact up to 40% in 2020 and to 73% in 2030. The
present study figured out the dynamism characteristic and outflow of
the system design. It is concluded through the model testing and
validation that the present dynamic model is competent and could deal
with mobile phone e-waste production.

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