The objectives of this project included (1) to investigate resource recycling costs and economic benefits of implementing agencies, (2) to develop performance indicators for resource recycling, (3) to access environmental pollution risk through investigating waste electrical appliances flows. Based on proportional allocation, this project randomly sampled 57 implementing agencies and then conducted on-site investigations on resource recycle costs and the flows of waste electrical appliances. According to the results of our survey, the average resource recycling costs of an implementing agency was about NT$35,000,000 per year and personnel costs had the highest ratio. Furthermore, indicators for evaluating recycling performance of implementing agencies were divided into three parts, including (1) recycling performance indicators, (2) recycling efficiency indicators and (3) financial sustainability indicators. Although they were easy to conduct, recycling performance indicators tended to attach too much weight to labor inputs. Recycling efficiency indicators, on the contrary, considered the overall resource allocation of inputs and outputs at the same time but difficult to conduct. In addition, most of the implementing agencies just sorted electrical appliances out without dismantling them before selling to recycling manufacturers. Although waste electrical appliances announced for recycling were usually sent to legal treatment plants, the flows of non-announced ones were uncertain. Waste wire and printed circuit board, in particular, were sent to illegal plants or exported abroad. With the rise of this uncertainty, the risk of environmental pollution becomes even greater. Therefore, we suggested trace how the electrical appliances get re-used in order to reducing dead spaces of the recycling management.

Resource recycle costs；Performance indicators for resource recycling；Waste electrical appliances flows