Background Information
Electrodissolution: dissolving metals using a power source and a highly conductive and acidic liquid.
Electronic waste is a fast growing environmental problem. Rapid technology change, low initial cost, and planned obsolescence all act to produce an ever growing quantity of e-waste. Due to the high cost of recycling and a reclamation differential present in computer parts, recycling can be expensive and complicated. In places without the limitations and safe guards of environmental laws, the high cost differential and large surplus create a situation where massive amounts of e-waste can be cheaply processed. However, the reclamation waste products, such as heavy metals, are free to enter the ecosystem. For example, the city of Guiyu, China is home to one of the largest e-waste landfills in the world, and because of this it is also one of the most polluted locations in the world. The heavy metal concentrations in the local water supply became so high that the city is forced to import drinking water. Processing involves the extraction of copper, gold, silver and other precious metals by burning, melting and dissolving. Waste products, like lead, cadmium, copper and arsenic, eventually find their way into the surrounding water bodies and soil.
Electronic waste is a fast growing environmental problem. Rapid technology change, low initial cost, and planned obsolescence all act to produce an ever growing quantity of e-waste. Due to the high cost of recycling and a reclamation differential present in computer parts, recycling can be expensive and complicated. In places without the limitations and safe guards of environmental laws, the high cost differential and large surplus create a situation where massive amounts of e-waste can be cheaply processed. However, the reclamation waste products, such as heavy metals, are free to enter the ecosystem. For example, the city of Guiyu, China is home to one of the largest e-waste landfills in the world, and because of this it is also one of the most polluted locations in the world. The heavy metal concentrations in the local water supply became so high that the city is forced to import drinking water. Processing involves the extraction of copper, gold, silver and other precious metals by burning, melting and dissolving. Waste products, like lead, cadmium, copper and arsenic, eventually find their way into the surrounding water bodies and soil.
Conceptual Approach
I am interested in simulating the processes that occur naturally in unconfined e-waste landfills. I am specifically interested in the history of heavy metals such as iron, lead, aluminum and copper as they move from mining to electronics to toxic leachate in the ecosystem. Heavy metals are able to “hold” or transport their conceptual history more readily than carbon or oxygen for a number of reasons: they are present in our society in native form, they are highly visibile, and they are relatively simple compared to the highly complex and enumerable organic compounds. By modeling the processes that occur in unregulated “third world” landfills, I hope to 1) gain understanding, through experience, of the effects and consequences of unchecked waste management, 2) partake in the history of these objects and metals, 3) increase awareness of viewers and 4) create a new “end product” (either a 2D painting, photography or film) out of the waste I produce, that is drastically different from the original electronic components.
I am interested in simulating the processes that occur naturally in unconfined e-waste landfills. I am specifically interested in the history of heavy metals such as iron, lead, aluminum and copper as they move from mining to electronics to toxic leachate in the ecosystem. Heavy metals are able to “hold” or transport their conceptual history more readily than carbon or oxygen for a number of reasons: they are present in our society in native form, they are highly visibile, and they are relatively simple compared to the highly complex and enumerable organic compounds. By modeling the processes that occur in unregulated “third world” landfills, I hope to 1) gain understanding, through experience, of the effects and consequences of unchecked waste management, 2) partake in the history of these objects and metals, 3) increase awareness of viewers and 4) create a new “end product” (either a 2D painting, photography or film) out of the waste I produce, that is drastically different from the original electronic components.
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