Where your "recycled" e-waste really goes
This week on "Overtime" we have the first in a summer series of "Correspondent Favorites." We begin with Scott Pelley, as he prepares to take over the anchor chair at "The CBS Evening News." When we asked him to choose a personal favorite from the "60 Minutes" archives, Scott decided on his 2008 investigation of "e-waste," or electronic waste. His team's investigation followed the surprising path of recycled computer parts from Denver, Colorado all the way to a toxic dump in China.
It's illegal to import toxic e-waste, but it's also lucrative: junked computers, televisions, and other used electronic products can be mined for valuable components, including gold. Scott set out to understand the black market dismantling of e-waste, and it eventually led him to Hong Kong and the toxic dumps of Guiyu, China, a notoriously polluted city with the highest levels of cancer-causing dioxins in the world.
"The Wasteland," Scott says, "is the kind of reporting I hope we can bring over to "The CBS Evening News," because that's the kind of thing that the audience is looking for: original reporting, unique insight, and reporters who just never give up."
Pelley and his producing team of Solly Granatstein and Nicole Young won multiple awards for their investigation including an Emmy, an Investigative Reporters & Editors award, a Gerald Loeb award, an Edward R. Murrow, and a Sigma Delta Chi award.