Executive Summary

This white paper examines the overall environmental impact of materials used in mobile phones, from the extraction of raw materials and component manufacturing required to produce the latest models, to the appropriate recovery and recycling of these products at end-of-life (EoL). While the scope of this paper is limited to mobile phones, similar materials are used in many other high technology products, including personal computers, portable entertainment players, and other types of information and communications devices. Energy consumption and radio frequency emissions at the product level are outside the scope of this paper.