E-waste refers to any electrical and electronic equipment that has been discarded by its owner as waste,without the intent to reuse it.The term covers a very wide range of products.It can include:households with circuitry or electrical components for delivering power;Business products that do the same;Temperature exchange equipment for cooling and freezing,like refrigerators,air conditioners and heat pumps;Screens or monitors;1.Large equipment like washing machines,clothes dryers,dish-washing machines,electric stoves,large printing machines,etc.Smaller equipment like microwaves,ventilation equipment,video cameras,electronic tools,etc.Small IT and telecommunication equipment like mobile phones,pocket calculators,printers,etc.For many of these products,there's an increasingly short replacement cycle as technological advances keep updating each device on a regular basis,offering consumers a new and improved model.And it's not just smartphones that consumers replace frequently.Upgrades can include higher speeds and newer technologies,so older equipment gets replaced even if it's not broken or obsolete.What it becomes,in the minds of the consumers,is outdated-too slow,or without the latest features.The study also noted that another change is that in many countries,people own multiple devices.That means they also have multiple devices to discard.
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