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I agree with your main point about disposability. There shouldn’t be many iPhones in landfills, though. Apple recycles 100% of the materials, so as long as the

I agree with your main point about disposability. There shouldn’t be many iPhones in landfills, though. Apple recycles 100% of the materials, so as long as the old phone can be traded in or dropped off in an electronics bin, it won’t be wasted even though the owner will have been out the money by rebuying prematurely.

kalleboo 9y ago
> Apple recycles 100% of the materials Do you have a source for that? It sounds hard to believe
- Fezzik 9y ago
  If Apple gets its hands on the phone they have an impressive system for recycling: http://www.businessinsider.com/apple-liam-iphone-recycling-robot-photos-video-2017-4 http://www.businessinsider.com/apple-liam-iphone-recycling-r... I could not find a reliable source for what portion of each phone is recycled, but Apple is certainly not slacking on the recycling front.
  - kalleboo 9y ago
    As far as I can tell, Liam is just an R&D project - it's not something they've put into actual production. E.g. from the 2017 environmental report > For example, we’ve melted down iPhone 6 aluminum enclosures recovered from Liam to make Mac mini computers for use in our factories It's only recovered enough aluminum to build a couple of Mac minis for their own internal use
- 1123581321 9y ago
  Thanks for asking - yes, I was wrong about that. The main document you should read is https://images.apple.com/environment/pdf/Apple_Environmental_Responsibility_Report_2017.pdf https://images.apple.com/environment/pdf/Apple_Environmental... where there are some 100%s, but they don't make this particular promise. In that report, they list iPhone 6 disassembly recovery by kg/100k phones (search for Tungsten.) Cross-reference with the components by weight for the iPhone 6S (6 is not available; see https://www.apple.com/environment/reports/ https://www.apple.com/environment/reports/ for all reports.) Ignoring battery, screen and plastic leaves .063kg/phone, and according to that side bar, Liam recovers .033kg/phone or ~50%. Assuming Apple recycles most of the battery, screen and plastic, they are recovering ~75% of each 6S. That's pretty good, and it's good to know that the unrecoverable portions are staying out of the trash (and hopefully heat/vapor waste is mitigated), but it's years away from being close enough to 100% to round up.

kalleboo 9y ago

> Apple recycles 100% of the materials Do you have a source for that? It sounds hard to believe

Fezzik 9y ago
If Apple gets its hands on the phone they have an impressive system for recycling: http://www.businessinsider.com/apple-liam-iphone-recycling-robot-photos-video-2017-4 http://www.businessinsider.com/apple-liam-iphone-recycling-r... I could not find a reliable source for what portion of each phone is recycled, but Apple is certainly not slacking on the recycling front.
- kalleboo 9y ago
  As far as I can tell, Liam is just an R&D project - it's not something they've put into actual production. E.g. from the 2017 environmental report > For example, we’ve melted down iPhone 6 aluminum enclosures recovered from Liam to make Mac mini computers for use in our factories It's only recovered enough aluminum to build a couple of Mac minis for their own internal use
1123581321 9y ago
Thanks for asking - yes, I was wrong about that. The main document you should read is https://images.apple.com/environment/pdf/Apple_Environmental_Responsibility_Report_2017.pdf https://images.apple.com/environment/pdf/Apple_Environmental... where there are some 100%s, but they don't make this particular promise. In that report, they list iPhone 6 disassembly recovery by kg/100k phones (search for Tungsten.) Cross-reference with the components by weight for the iPhone 6S (6 is not available; see https://www.apple.com/environment/reports/ https://www.apple.com/environment/reports/ for all reports.) Ignoring battery, screen and plastic leaves .063kg/phone, and according to that side bar, Liam recovers .033kg/phone or ~50%. Assuming Apple recycles most of the battery, screen and plastic, they are recovering ~75% of each 6S. That's pretty good, and it's good to know that the unrecoverable portions are staying out of the trash (and hopefully heat/vapor waste is mitigated), but it's years away from being close enough to 100% to round up.