EDITORIAL: Albany makes it easier to recycle that old laptop

It took months of Albany arm-wrestling to get the deal done, but the result was well worth it: You'll now have more options for recycling old electronic equipment.

Computers and other today-indispensable-but-tomorrow-obsolete elements of modern life have toxic ingredients that need to be recycled, not buried in landfills or incinerated. So the idea was to make manufacturers pay the costs of collecting the old stuff and recycling it to make new stuff.

The Assembly didn't want anyone to have to pay a fee to manufacturers for recycling. But some manufacturers had been charging large businesses to recycle major items, and they wanted to continue charging those fees.

In the end, after a lot of back and forth in which Assemb. Robert Sweeney (D-Lindenhurst) played a vital role, what we got is one of the strongest recycling laws in the country. Consumers, small businesses and almost all nonprofits are spared any fees. Manufacturers of electronic goods are required to recycle a certain weight of devices, based on their market share in the state. But they get to devise the methods themselves.

That might take the form of pickups at retailers, mail-backs, regular recycling days, or even payments to municipal recycling programs. The bottom line: When it takes effect next year, you'll have easier, more environmentally friendly, more convenient ways to return your obsolete stuff to the industry that made it - and made it obsolescent - in the first place. hN