2020 Olympics goes green with recycled medals

The medals awarded to the athletes in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics will contain gold, silver and bronze recovered from the recycling of electronic devices.

Mobile phones contain metals such as gold. You can get 1g of gold from 35 phones. It may not sound like a lot, but when you consider how many mobile phones are out there it becomes substantial.

The organisers of the Olympics in Tokyo, Japan, sent out a call to people to donate their mobile phones to gather two tonnes (2 000kg) of gold, silver and bronze for the 5 000 medals needed for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics and Paralympics, Newcastle Advertiser reports.

The recovered metals make up only a small percentage of the total metals used in the medals, but their use is consistent with the sustainability philosophy of the Olympic and Paralympic Games.

The electronic components of the devices were shredded, separated and heated to recover the metals, which were then combined with the mined metal from other sources.

Tokyo is one of the biggest tech hubs in the world. The gold and silver in discarded electronic devices in Japan amounts to 16 percent and 22 percent, respectively, of the world’s supply of gold and silver e-waste.