Forecasting electronic waste flows for effective circular economy planning

Abstract

Rapid evolution in the consumer electronics sector has created new resource and waste challenges that are inadequately managed in the current linear product system. Circular economy (CE) strategies offer potential to close the loop on electronic products and materials, but often lack the future-oriented perspective needed to keep pace with this dynamic sector. The present study addresses this challenge by developing a logistic forecasting material flow model that can predict future resource and waste flows for products with abundant historic sales data (mature products) as well as for products that have just entered the market (emerging products). One of the key trends observed across current and legacy electronics is the steadily shrinking innovation cycle, where the time between a product’s market entry and peak sales is decreasing over time. This trend, coupled with extensive historic and modern product sales data, was used to create adoption scenario forecasts for emerging products, like fitness trackers, smart thermostats, and drones. Findings show that these devices are likely to have rapid uptake in the market, but may be quickly replaced by subsequent product innovations. In contrast, waste flow forecasts for mature products like CRTs, desktops, monitors and flat panel TVs showed their declining contribution to the U.S. e-waste stream. This study contributes a modeling framework that can be used to inform CE strategies in electronics by identifying near term opportunities and risks in end-of-life management of products to extend product life and close the loop on key materials.