Understanding the Knowledge Gap: Solar PV Waste Management
SUMMARY The Government of Bangladesh is promoting solar electricity generating technology, and installing various Nano-grid, micro-grid systems countrywide. Many components, used in solar technology are reaching their end-life, and contributing to an accumulation of e-waste. The majority of the e-waste generated in Bangladesh gets recycled through unregulated informal channels in a casual manner by unskilled workers. Research we have reviewed shows that there are significant adverse impacts on health, safety, and environmental issues. Therefore, coming up with laws and policies relating to the management of solar technology related e-waste has become a priority task. Practical Action and LCEDN have studied this issue and the research available and are pleased to make some recommendations.
Bangladesh generates roughly 2.8 million metric tons of electronic waste or e-waste annually (Islam, 2016). The use of mobile phones, electrical and electronic appliances. generate a massive amount of residues which make their way to the open environment every year. As Bangladesh is hoping to, and progressing well to become digitalised in the near future, the usage of electronic equipment will rise at a faster pace. E-waste is collected, segregated, dismantled and recycled in the informal sector based in the slums around the country. Currently the recycling of the disposed electronic products is mostly handled by the informal sector. The users of electronics, the collectors of e-waste, the workers who are involved in the e-waste recycling itself, are mostly unaware of the potential harmful effects that are caused by e-waste. The users often dump the e-waste with household wastes which makes its way to the open landfills, on farming land and in waterbodies. The recyclers also dump the unusable parts of the e-waste, after extracting the parts they need. There are areas dedicated to e-waste recycling in many parts of Bangladesh – which are informal. The workers in these areas end up working in extremely hazardous conditions, including continuous exposures to tremendously dangerous substances, coming from the activities relating to e-waste management. Such activities are exposing the mass population to heavy metals and acids coming from these e-wastes. the ones who are working directly the e-waste are the most affected ones. However, mass population are also being affected through indirect exposure as the environment is being affected. There exists a knowledge gap regarding how to confine these activities to a limited space for limiting the harmful substance’s exposure to the environment. There are existing knowledge gaps regarding the containment and exposure of harmful substances including the safety issues like health hazards, lack of protective measures and exposure of those substances to physical bodies.
Solar energy in Bangladesh The solar PV (photovoltaic) is a system that converts sunshine energy from the Sun into electricity. The electricity generated can be used within the household, building or exported to the grid. Solar electricity is generated on site, using solar energy source, with zero carbon emissions. There are various types of solar technology, among which are solar modules, solar tiles, and solar film. All will generate some electricity in diffused light or at cloudy condition although they work much better in direct sunlight. However, the systems are still expensive to procure and install, even though in some cases grants are available to help offset the initial outlay. The technology requires little maintenance apart from being required to be kept free of debris, dust and shading. The government of Bangladesh has a vision of making electricity available to all the citizens by the year 2021, of which about 10% are targeted to be from renewable energy sources. In line with this vision, to date, about 6 million solar home systems (SHS) have been installed in Bangladesh. IDCOL alone has established 4.12 million SHS by 2017, that served around 18.6 million people (IDCOL report). They have also undertaken solar mini grid and solar irrigation projects. The panels and batteries that are being used to generate and store the solar energy, ultimately will reach their end-life, and will need to be dumped or recycled somewhere. In 2012 alone, about 200,000 lead-acid batteries were disposed in Bangladesh. Therefore, coming up with a solar electricity generating technology based e-waste management standard has become a priority task.
E-waste management in Bangladesh Majority of the e-waste generated, including the ones from solar electricity generation technology, get recycled through an unregulated informal channel. 89% of the total jobs available in the Bangladeshi labor market are in the informal market (ADB, 2012). The nature of the work done in the informal sector are mostly carried out by unskilled workers in a casual manner, are irregularly paid, and working hours last up to an average of 54 hours a week (ADB, 2012). Informal scrap collectors or vangariwala, collects the e-waste from the users, including households, offices, factories etc. They sell it to the second hand market, or does some repairing before selling. They sell these item to the consumers, second hand shops, the bulk collectors and the manual dismantlers. Once they are dismantled, the different components circulate around the channel for further processing, and recycling activities. For example, the glass components go to glass recyclers, metallic parts go to the ones who are working with metals. The rest, that does not seemingly have further usage, are dumped.
The final step of the value chain is recycling, where precious and special metals, and other materials are extracted from the component. The manual dismantling and recycling stages include open burning, acid treatment, etc. E-waste contains around 1000 different chemicals, many of which contain high levels of toxins and hazardous elements. If e-waste is not recycled and disposed of in an environmentally prudent manner, it can pose serious threats to both human health and the environment.
Health and environmental impacts Around 1, 20,000 urban poor are involved in the informal market, among which about 50,000 are under 10 years of age. (Riyad, A.S.M. et al, 2014) Every year more than 15% child worker died during and after effect of e- waste recycling and more than 83% are exposed by toxics substances and become sick and live with long term illness (ESDO, 2014). According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), lead exposure can cause miscarriage, stillbirths, and infertility (in both men and women). A person who is exposed to lead over time may fee: abdominal pain, constipated, depressed, distracted, nauseous/ sick. Prolonged exposure may also cause high blood pressure, heart disease, kidney disease, and reduced fertility. Children are especially vulnerable to the health risks that may result from e-waste exposure. The health effects are the same for human lead exposure by breathing in, shallowing or absorbing. But the body absorbs higher levels of lead when it is breathed-in. Difficulties in relation to lead poisoning may occur slowly, thus it can be easily overlooked. Exposure to high levels of lead may cause anaemia, weakness, kidney and brain damage – death can occur due to extreme high exposure.
RECOMMENDATIONS It is important to consider the waste disposal elements of solar systems and the need for regulatory guidelines in order to protect the health and safety of casual workers and the more general population. It is important to refurbish the policies and communicate them effectively to the key audiences. Through this research, the recommendations are as follows; Minimising the health and environmental risks, relating to the e-waste disposal, requires multisector engagement and collaborative strategies at the national level. A multi-stakeholder committee should be formed consisting of key people from the energy, health, environmental protection, and the private recycling sectors. Government’s should set proper standards for carrying out recycling of e-waste. And Government should strengthen the supervision and inspection of these activities. General awareness raising and enforcement related activities should be carried out by the government and the practitioners in order to change the overall behavioural pattern in relation to e-waste management and the health and safety aspects. Funds should be allocated by the government to carry out applied research in relation to e-waste management. Government can provide soft loans to help the recycling business owners to upgrade their systems to become more environmentally friendly Academia should conduct applied research in sector, developing curricula for academic and training purposes to promote overall behavioural change of the next generation of citizens. To ensure the research findings are communicated to the key audiences, academia should engage with practitioners and encourage co-ordination between the two.
An academic study conducted in Bangladesh with a sample from the e-waste workers, who have been working for at least a year, shows, workers working with recycling batteries have lead levels of 39.70 up to 78.70 micrograms per decilitre in their blood. The maximum safe level is considered to be 5 micrograms per decilitre (Ahmad et al, 2014). Among them, acidifying workers are exposed to 78.70 μgm/dL of lead, plate making workers are exposed to 73.57 μgm/dL of lead, old battery breaking workers are exposed to 66.77 μgm/dL of lead, and the workers who are not at all involved in the battery recycling work are exposed to about 39.70 μgm/dL of lead in their blood (Ahmad et al, 2014). Tests done on workers who have used Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) has shown some difference in the blood lead level. It has been recorded that people who have used PPE had lead level on their blood to be 61.95 μ gm/dL, while for people who did not use PPE showed the level of lead to be 67.76 μgm/dL (Ahmad et al, 2014). Such high level of lead poisoning is potentially a national social crisis. Minimizing the health and environmental risks, relating to the e-waste disposal, requires multisector engagement and collaborative strategies. The solution to this complex issue requires collaboration from various stakeholders, particularly due to its vast adverse impact on health, safety, and environmental issues. Impacts in these cases are primarily long-term, thus, could get overlooked. The users and recyclers need to demonstrate a responsible attitude toward safe disposal of e-waste. Mass awareness raising and enforcement will be required for changing the overall behavioural pattern in relation to e-waste management. The health and environmental impacts due to the exposure to highly hazardous substances, even within a limited capacity, needs to be communicated to the mass for a better understanding of the overall issue for their potential behavioural change.
Research findings are a credible way of ensuring reliable information dissemination among different stakeholders. However, there is lack of proper research in this particular field, for example appropriate technologies, financing and business model, policy action research etc. The research that do get carried out on a limited scale, are targeted toward publication and are for sharing among other academics. Oftentimes, these evidence based findings do not reach the most affected stakeholders, or the practitioners – who are potentially in the position to disseminate the research information to them. The government, academia, practitioners, and other relevant stakeholders can work together for bridging the overall knowledge gap. It is important to recognize the strengths of each party and draft a clear strategy for working together collaboratively. To generate reliable data and findings, more research needs to be carried out. Academicians, carrying out the research, do not have the mandate to raise awareness of the general public. There is also lack of finance, prioritisation and other relevant barriers. More investment is needed from the government to fund more activities to raise awareness, generate findings, and enforce behavioural change among users, manufacturers, and other relevant groups. A multiple stakeholder committee can be formed consisting of key people from the energy, health and environmental protection sectors. The committee can play an integral part in deciding how to proceed with e-waste disposal and management by properly coordinating among one another. There is a need for proper coordination between researchers and practitioners. One such way to do so could be engaging the networks of researchers with the networks of practitioners. For example, the Institute of Energy under the University of Dhaka can engage the Bangladesh Biogas Development Foundation (BBDF) for their annual meetings. Similarly, the practitioners should engage the teams of researchers for the better networking.
The practitioners can convey the research findings, policies, rules and regulations, raise the overall awareness of the general population, for future betterment. In this regards, the users can be sensitised with the help of their community organisers, the microfinance institutions that fund or facilitate their solar home system installation; meaning the user’s first point of contact. When it comes to sensitising the workers, the factories and their owners can be targeted for broader awareness raising and enforcement. Academia can be utilised as a key player in developing, promoting and implementing proper disposal and management standards or guidelines. Aside from carrying out research, they can play a crucial role in sensitising the next generation through integrating this issue into curricula. The students of undergraduate and postgraduate degrees, who are potentially the next generation of government employees, researchers, practitioners or business owners, can be oriented with the environmental and health related impact of waste management from early on. They can also be prepared to understand and internalize the social, financial and business aspects of it, leading to a broader preparedness of the next generation. Furthermore, the government, the academicians, and the practitioners can come together to develop, promote, and implement training courses on both, waste and e-waste management, for the technical workers from accredited organisations like Bangladesh Technical Education Board (BTEB). The following table outlines the key roles, different stakeholders will have to play in order to ensure a smooth implementation of proper e-waste disposal and management;
Sl. Stakeholder
Key role for making a change
01. Users/ other related stakeholders
• Responsible attitude toward safe disposal • Willingness to spend money for safe disposal
02. Recyclers
• Responsible attitude toward safe collection, transportation and disposal of unusable materials • Upgradation to a cleaner recycling facility
• Awareness raising • Soft loan
03. Academia
• Conduct applied research • Engage younger generation in the discussion – include it in the curricula • Come up with solutions for demand led issues – e.g biz model, bCC materials etc.
Funding allocation
04. Government
• Set national standards • Prepare guideline • Provide soft loans for upgradation • Enforce good practices • Periodic inspections • Allocate funds for research and strengthening institutional capacity
05. Practitioners
• Raising mass awareness • Implement standard to the field
06. Business organisations
Fund safe disposal as a part of their CSR activity
07. Manufacturers Ensure disposal to be a part of the production and recycle process
Support needed Awareness raising
Enforcement
From the government’s side, it is also important to set proper standards for carrying out recycling related works. The Environment Conservation Rules, 1997, outlines various set of standards for parameters of air, water, odour, sound pollution. However, no standard has been set for the recycling related activities. This is resulting is lack of supervision or inspection in the sector. In the absence of proper standard, it is not possible for the authorities to monitor these activities in terms of environmental threats. The government of Bangladesh is promoting the usage of solar energy countrywide. The market demand is also increasing rapidly. So, it is certainly assumable that the management of the waste produced from this solar electricity generating technologies will be a crying need in the coming days. Time has come to assess the needs for waste disposal and management related standardised regulatory guidelines and initiatives to achieve a better and safer life for all the workers and the general population. It is important to refurbish the policies and communicating them to the mass. Business entities and manufacturers of the harmful products need to face regular inspection and ensure a disposal management policy of their produced goods.
REFERENCES Asian Development Bank: Country Report, 2010; retrieved from https://www.adb.org/sites/default/files/publication/3008 4/informal-sector-informal-employment-bangladesh.pdf IDCOL Annual Report, 2017; retrieved from http://idcol.org/annual_report/Annual_Report_2017.pdf ESDO report, 2014, “Magnitude of the Flow of E-waste in Bangladesh”, retrieved from http://esdo.org/wp-content/uploads/Magnitude-of-the-Flo w-of-E-waste-in-Bangladesh-ESDO-update-2015.pdf Riyad, A.S.M. & MAHBUB HASSAN, KH & JABED IQBAL, M & ABDUR RAHIM, M & WASI UDDIN, S.M.. (2014). “E-waste recycling practices in Bangladesh”. International Journal of Renewable Energy and Environmental Engineering. http://www.academia.edu/11813331/E-waste_recycling_p ractices_in_Bangladesh Sk. Akhtar Ahmad, Manzurul Haque Khan, Salamat Khandker, et al. (2014), “Blood Lead Levels and Health Problems of Lead Acid Battery Workers in Bangladesh,” The Scientific World Journal. https://doi.org/10.1155/2014/974104.
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Practical Action is a UK based international NGO, uses technology to provide solutions to poverty. Through technology, it enables poor people to challenge poverty and build on their skills and knowledge to find practical and sustainable solutions. Practical Action undertakes distinctive practical approach including wellbeing, partnership, specialised knowledge services and policy engagement. For details: www.practicalaction.org Low Carbon Development Network (LCEDN) is funded the project for the to encourage and ensure research has impact at the grassroots.