In terms of sustainability, recyclers have long understood the value in collecting useable parts and metals from e-waste (discarded mobile phones, televisions and computers). Yet, whether such a scheme made sense in terms of financial impact has only been recently determined thanks to a new report in ACS' journal Environmental Science & Technology.

According to the study, researchers have discovered that reusing gold, copper and other metals recovered from e-waste (a process called urban mining) was less expensive than actually mining for these metals.

To reach that conclusion, researchers consulted eight recycling companies in China to determine how much urban mining would cost when measured against ore mining. Although there are expenses associated with urban mining such as the cost of waste collection, energy, material, transportation and labor, they are offset against both government subsidies and the revenue generated from selling the recovered materials and components.

Consequently, researchers determined it would cost 13 times more for ore mining than it would cost for urban mining.

For more on the study, go to the journal Environmental Science & Technology