A critical analysis of the sustainability of mobile phone use

In the last twenty years, there has been a sharp increase in the consumption of commodities with a short life-cycle. This is especially true for electronic equipment such as mobile phones, which are the focus of this paper. The short lifespan, which is due to continually substituting obsolete equipment with newer and more innovative models, has stimulated the growth in sales of these electronic goods. Europe continues to be the main mobile phone market in developed countries, but this growth has slowed down over the last two years. Despite being an already mature market, Italy has a "diffusion rate" (i.e., the number of active lines per 100 inhabitants) higher than 146, which is the highest in the European Union. This scenario demonstrated the need for a study examining the sustainability of the mobile phone sector according to two critical aspects that are often due to the behavioural patterns of the users: the first is the energy consumption of mobile phones and their associated equipment, and the second is related to the conflicting link between potential dematerialisation due to the miniaturisation of the devices and the resource consumption and waste generated in this sector. This paper discusses these two critical aspects and presents an overview of the Italian mobile phone sector, particularly related to the energy consumption during the use phase and increase of mass flows due to the devices circulating in Italy and the higher amount of the disposable products that have to be managed. The results show that, in Italy, the entire mobile phone system consumes approximately 2200 GWh per year, which is equal to 0.7% of the national electricity consumption, and produces potential e-waste from end-of-life devices totalling over 11 thousand tonnes for the period from 2007 to 2012. Concerning the issue of resources consumption, this estimate highlights that the potential savings in inputs, due to the reduction in device weight over time, has always been counteracted by their increasing demand. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.