Recycling of Computer housings (was: Vinyl Chloride Odor)

[Peter Thomas <P_Thomas2@compuserve.com>]

  Message text written by "Charlie  Cray"
  >are you SURE that computer housings (like IBMs) are made from 
  recycled computers?  Where do you get that from?  What percentage of 
  all computers and of those that are composed of recycled material, 
  what percentage is virgin?  
  <
  
  Hydro Polymers and Geon have a joint venture in the UK for supplying
  moulding compound to the likes of IBM and the other UK manufacturers of
  monitors and keyboards. IBM in particular operate a reclaim scheme that
  brings back old machines which are then stripped out. All the metals and
  glass are removed and the carcases are returned to Hydro Geon for
  granulating and regrinding.
  
  There was a paper presented at "Current Trends in PVC" which was held in
  Loughborough this month talking about the technical aspects of this. The
  most interesting thing was than even at 100% recycled material it was
  possible to reprocess the material 3 or 4 times. This would not happen in
  practice because the amount of reclaim would not match the production
  required neither would the colour consistency be good enough.
  
  In addition the market for monitors on computers is expanding at a
  tremendous rate and until the rate at which peple scrap their computers is
  equel to the rate at which they are produced you will always have to use
  virgin material
  
  If you contact Jason Leadbitter at Hydro Polymers in the UK he can give you
  more details
  
  Pete Thomas
  My opinions are my own not those of my employer