A new mobile phone network called C Mobile are endeavouring to help people become more environmentally friendly with a contract that promises to reinvest profits into energy efficient projects across the UK.
C Mobile have an agreement with Orange to share existing phone masts to avoid the environmental impacts associated with installing new phone masts.
The company also offers a mobile phone recycling service which claims never to refuse to recycle a phone however old it may be. The company says that 97% of old mobiles have a value and can be re-used for resale or by the industry for insurance replacements.
Users who sell their phone through their site can either take the value of the phone or choose to donate the value to C Mobile Trust local renewable energy projects.
According to C Mobile’s website, the average life of a phone is only 18 months, despite the fact that most phones have a natural usable life of up to seven years. In the UK alone, 15 million old mobiles are upgraded every year and there are over 100 million old mobile phones lying around, most of which still have a monetary value.
More importantly, if disposed of incorrectly, these old mobile phones can end up in landfill, and harm our eco-systems. Just one mobile phone battery contains enough cadmium to pollute up to 600,000 litres of water.