New record: over 100,000 tons of electrical and electronic devices recycled

For the first time in its 35-year history, SENS eRecycling and its partners processed over 100,000 tons of electrical and electronic appliances last year. From this, they recovered 70,000 tons of recyclable materials and returned them to the raw materials cycle. This is 4% more than in 2023. In the same period, they disposed of 187 tons of harmful substances, which corresponds to an increase of around 5% compared to the previous year. Pasqual Zopp, Managing Director of SENS eRecycling, believes that one reason for these increases is the greater efficiency of the recycling processes. The general trend of more and more electrical appliances being powered by rechargeable batteries instead of cables also plays a role.

"I am delighted that we were able to set a new record in the processing of electrical and electronic appliances in 2024 with over 100,000 tons," says Pasqual Zopp, who has been Managing Director of SENS eRecycling since 2022. "Together with our partners, we professionally disposed of 187 tons of harmful substances alone, including mercury and refrigerants, and recycled over 70,000 tons of recyclable materials last year. In doing so, we once again made an important contribution to an intact environment and the Swiss circular economy." Every year, SENS eRecycling reports its environmental performance in the form of environmental impact points, or EIPs for short (see info box at the end). In 2024, the environmental benefit amounted to 1,443 billion UBP. This is roughly equivalent to the environmental impact of the annual consumption of the inhabitants of the city of Thun. Above all, the constant investments made by SENS eRecycling's partner companies in state-of-the-art technology have also made a difference, says Pasqual Zopp: "Thanks to the recycling plants in the SENS network, which are among the most modern in Europe, we have been able to further increase the efficiency of the recycling process." In 2024, the processed quantities of harmful substances increased by 5% and those of processed recyclable materials by 4%, with iron, plastics, steel, copper and aluminum leading the table of recyclable materials in terms of quantity for years.

Volume of PV modules doubled

In terms of quantities processed, SENS eRecycling only recorded a slight decline in refrigerators, freezers and air conditioning appliances (-8% compared to 2023). This is mainly due to the fact that larger stocks were reduced in 2023. In the meantime, volumes have returned to pre-2022 levels. In contrast, the quantities processed for large and small electrical appliances increased significantly by 8% each compared to 2023 and by 11% for light bulbs. However, the 100% increase in the processing of photovoltaic modules stands out in particular: SENS eRecycling attributes this doubling to the fact that more and more modules are currently being decommissioned in Switzerland due to their age. The service life of PV modules is usually between 25 and 30 years. However, in order to extend this and bring the modules back onto the market as second-hand products, SENS eRecycling recently laid the foundations for the circular use of PV modules with the PV Circle project. Find out more here:www.pv-circle.ch.

Slight decrease in overall environmental benefit

Although the overall benefit of electrical appliance recycling fell by around 4% last year, at 1,443 billion UBP it remains at a comparably high level to two years ago. At 712 billion UBP, refrigerators, freezers and air conditioners continue to contribute the most to the total environmental benefit. This is despite the slight decline in the environmental benefit in this appliance category of -7% compared to 2023. The reason for this is that stocks of refrigerators were processed in the previous year and therefore significantly more was recycled than in 2024. The relatively small amount of 1,000 tons of light bulbs is also astonishing, but they are in third place with over 54 billion UBP contributing to the total environmental benefit of SENS eRecycling. While the avoidance of harmful greenhouse gases such as CFCs and HFCs is the main environmental benefit of refrigerators, freezers and air conditioners, the avoidance of mercury is the main environmental benefit of light bulbs.

The importance of pollutant removal and recycling in the future

In contrast, the significant decrease of -25% compared to 2023 for small household appliances is rather unusual. Pasqual Zopp sees a possible reason for this decline, despite the higher collection volumes compared to 2023, in the fact that recycling companies are processing fewer and fewer electrical appliances containing hazardous polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs): "As PCBs degrade very slowly in the environment, these harmful substances may no longer be processed in today's appliances. Accordingly, the proportion of contaminated appliances in our recycling plants has been decreasing for years" (see Figure 2).

With a total of 1,404 billion UBP, the removal of harmful substances accounts for the majority of the overall environmental benefits of SENS eRecycling. In particular, the professional and environmentally friendly processing of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), refrigerants and mercury makes a decisive contribution to the environmental performance of the SENS take-back system. The processing of recyclable materials with 40 billion UBP represents only a small but not insignificant share of the environmental benefits. "In the longer term, the importance of processing recyclable materials will continue to increase, especially if we manage to close further raw material cycles, such as those for PV modules, together with our partners from business and politics," the Managing Director of SENS eRecycling is convinced.