TOKYO -- Organizers of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics are hoping to source the gold, silver and bronze needed to make medals for the games by tapping the country's "urban mine" -- made up of millions of discarded smartphones and other small consumer electronics.
Such electronic waste contains enough precious metals to produce all the medals for the Olympic and Paralympic Games to be held in Japan's capital four years from now, according to a group of Olympic organizers, government officials and company executives that discussed the proposal in June.
For the 2012 London Olympics, 9.6kg of gold, 1,210kg of silver and 700kg of copper -- the primary component of bronze -- were used to produce medals. In comparison, the amount of precious metals recovered from discarded small consumer electronics in Japan in 2014 included 143kg of gold, 1,566kg of silver and 1,112 tons of copper.
Right now, they are arguing over whether the collection system will be private sector, or run by the government (see article for details).