Invest in e-waste

E-waste is growing 3 times faster than general municipal waste in Australia. Victoria is expected to generate more than 250,000 tonnes of e-waste by 2035.

The increase in supply

In July 2019, the Victorian Government introduced a ban on the disposal of e-waste to landfill. The ban aims to improve e-waste recovery and to reduce the risk of impacts on public health and the environment.

Following this ban, more than $16.5 million has been invested to:

• upgrade e-waste collection and storage facilities across the state
• deliver an education campaign supporting the ban.

The federal National Television and Computer Recycling Scheme (NTCRS) also gives households and small businesses free access to industry-funded collection and recycling services. The government is considering expanding the NTCRS to other categories of electrical and electronic products, including related materials such as batteries and solar photovoltaic (PV) systems, as a priority for a product stewardship approach.

For more information:

• National Television and Computer Recycling Scheme
• The stewardship priority products
• Read about the national approach to manage solar panel, inverter and battery lifecycles.

The Victorian Government is actively pursuing mechanisms to increase the recovery and reprocessing of e-waste and PV panels, including investing in additional infrastructure, emerging techniques and technologies.

Opportunities

There are opportunities for investors to participate in Victoria’s local e-waste reprocessing industry, including projected high volumes of PV panels, NTCRS products and other high-value e-waste.

• Significant mechanical reprocessing infrastructure capability is needed to enable high-value e-waste materials to be recovered across metropolitan Melbourne and regional Victoria.
• Emerging techniques and technologies for improved mechanical and optical, thermal, chemical, nano and biological processing.
• PV panels are an emerging e-waste stream expected to rapidly grow in future years due to the significant increase in the installation of PV systems over the last 10 to 15 years.

Stay up to date

For the latest investment opportunities and material commodity prices, read our regular Recovered Resources Market Bulletin.

To stay up to date with the latest grants and funding opportunities, register for our grants and funding alert.

Graphs and data

For more information on waste data, view our waste data, insights and tools.

Learn more

The Environment Protection Authority (EPA) manages and enforces Victoria’s e-waste policy and provides guidelines on managing e-waste including how to store, reprocess and dispose of it safely.

Read EPA’s advice on e-waste.

Victoria’s E-waste collection network provides a list of certified e-waste drop off sites.

Find your local e-waste collection site.

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