A Vision for the Circular Economy in Hard Disk Drives (HDDs) Based on Self-Management of Common Pool Resources

Metals recovery from electronics recycling is currently focused on high-volume, valuable metals that are easily recoverable. Current and future electronics will contain small quantities of resources available for recovery but... [ view full abstract ]

Metals recovery from electronics recycling is currently focused on high-volume, valuable metals that are easily recoverable. Current and future electronics will contain small quantities of resources available for recovery but are not currently recycled in today’s infrastructure. Trends toward miniaturization, dematerialization, and introduction of heterogeneous materials systems create new challenges with respect to materials supply and recovery.

To achieve a circular economy, the single most important element will be an economically viable reuse and recycling infrastructure. With an eye on how this vision can be realized, iNEMI (the International Electronics Manufacturing Initiative) undertook a project to examine the role its members could play in increasing value recovery from HDDs. It is based on the premise that reuse of HDDs is always the superior option due to the energy intensity of electronics manufacturing, the inherent value of functioning products and parts, and the opportunity created by dismantling for reuse to reverse the loss of critical raw materials experienced under the existing recycling paradigm.

The project aimed to investigate if the conditions existed to develop a voluntary, community-based solution involving adaptive governance systems to self-manage common pool resources inspired by the work of Ostrom.

It includes,

• a comprehensive assessment of the annual sales and trends of HDDs
• a projection of used HDDs available through a stocks and flows analysis using system dynamics
• a characterisation of the decision-trees employed by used HDD processors determining whether a drive goes for reuse (either directly, white labelled or for parts) or recycling for material recovery (largely based on shredding) including parameters that guide decisions.
• an overview of data security and destruction methods employed in such sanitization.
• an investigation of new pathways to value recovery including automated disassembly, removal of magnets and repurposing of magnets in motors
• an industry wide survey examining the barriers and potential solutions to implementing these pathways

Based on this analysis it is concluded that the key conditions necessary for self-management of common pool resources as defined in the Ostrom framework exists within the electronics sector as,

• the system dynamics are sufficiently predictable
• the number of users are well known and are of limited numbers, so that the stakeholders can be identified and included in organization.
• the leadership exists – The industry is well organized through associations and certain large companies are recognized as leaders. In terms of sustainability, iNEMI, the US EPA, and others have brought together key stakeholders to develop future scenarios and roadmaps to sustainability.
• the users of the resources share moral and ethical standards regarding how to behave in groups – The industry has worked well together on many initiatives, e.g. RoHS transition, iNEMI, EICC, IEC & EPEAT standard development.
• there exists a recognition of the importance of the resource to users – The increasing reliance of electronic products on the performance of certain technology metals, and the presence of geopolitical risks to their supply, have been well documented.  In addition, end-of-use electronics have been recognized as objects of potential value, whether for reuse, remanufacturing, or recycling.