Carol Stream plant demonstrates 'eCycling'

In 2002, people began bringing their used electronics to a small storefront in Lombard. The store's owners would attempt to “refurbish” the items — like removing old computer hard drive memory — and resell them.

Today, the company, now known as COM2 Recycling Solutions, operates a plant in Carol Stream that takes in nearly 5 million pounds of leaded glass every month from old computers, televisions and other consumer electronics. A staff of 88 sorts, dismantles and refurbishes it — a process some refer to as “eCycling.”

“At the time we didn't know that was recycling,” said Jeff Funderburg, the company's vice president of business development. “We thought we were in the computer business.”

On Tuesday, local and federal officials took a tour of the warehouse at 140 E. Fullerton Ave. in conjunction with the nationwide America Recycles Day.

The company employs a “glass-to-glass” recycling process: from old computer and TV monitors, cathode ray tubes are removed, cleaned and cut into diamond-like pieces of glass cullet — ready to be used in production of ceramic tile, countertops and new TV sets.

Beyond production of clean glass, COM2 still sells refurbished electronics at its Lombard store, although new technologies have changed the way the “eCycling” process happens today, Funderburg said.

Margaret Guerriero, the U.S. EPA's land and chemicals division director for the Great Lakes region, noted that Americans generate 2.4 million tons of used electronics every year, including TVs, cellphones and DVD players.

She said consumers have three options when it comes to their old electronics: reuse them, throw them out, or refurbish them.

“We're hoping that as companies like COM2 get certified, there will be less and less people with their first choice being ‘throw it in the garbage,'” Guerriero said. “It's not too long ago that recycling meant newspapers and tin cans. Here we are today talking about electronics.”