Recovery of small size electric and electronic waste and durable goods for the second-hand market: a case study in the municipality of Udine

Western countries\u2019 production of Electric and Electronic Equipment (EEE) is increasingly growing. Such EEEs market expansion, together with technology innovation, led to similarly growing substitution rate of such products, leading to a relevant increase in the associated EEE waste (WEEE) flows. The paper presents the technical-economic feasibility study undertaken by the municipality of Udine (Italy), which proposed an alternative solution to the traditional WEEE management, in order to promote systemic reuse by means of a reorganization of the logistic processes of the collecting centers designated to bulk items. Such reorganization is based on an \u201cEquipment Evaluation Center\u201d and a \u201cRe-use Center\u201d, in which the needed reparations are done in order to recover the product for the second-hand market or for components recovery to be re-used by the local manufacturing companies in a nearby light industrial are