Year 11 ICT Exam Preparation

Year 11 ICT Exam Preparation

Topic 1 – Environmental issues concerned with the growing use of

ICT

Contents

• Environmental impact of– Manufacture of computers– Personal usage of computers– Business usage of computers– Disposal of computers

Making a Computer

• What do the following two have in common?

Answer: The amount of materials required to make a single desktop computer is roughly equivalent to the weight of a small car

So what happens to the rest of that waste?

Why am I surrounded by 38 litres of water?

Because that’s what it takes to make a single

computer chip

How many billions of computers chips are there in the world?

So which is more important?

OR

Making a Computer

• Some of the materials used in constructing a PC– Tin– Silicon– Iron– Aluminium– Variety of plastics– Lead– Copper– Gold

– Dioxins– Polychlorinated

biphenyls– Cadmium– Chromium– Radioactive Isotopes– Mercury

Proper computer recycling laws only brought in 3 years ago – how many millions of computers are lying in the ground?

Our Use of Computers• (Watts x Hours Used / 1000) x cost per kilowatt per

hour = total cost

• British Gas cost per KWH – 1.5 pence• Watts used to run a computer – avg 300• Therefore for 12 hours a day this will cost £5.40• A laptop uses between 15 to 45 watts• For same time this will cost £0.81

• Multiply that by the number of home computers in the UK – how much power is required?

Business usage of computers

• That cost of running a single computer may be low

• How many computers are in this school?• How much electricity is required to run them?• What is the carbon footprint of these

computers?• What happens when they reach the end of

their lifespan?

Disposing of Computers

• Activity– Log on to the Internet– Find at least one recycling centre which takes

computers– Find at least one charity or company which takes

computers– Note down in your research template anything

which you have found out from the websites about recycling computers

Recycling

• In 2008 there were one billion computers in the world (27 years to reach this)

• and this is expected to double by 2015• In 2009 1.1 Billion mobile phones were sold• How many of these have been thrown away?• Does Recycling still pose a problem?

To Finish Off …

• You must now complete your notes for this section

• Think about what you need to focus on• Get your notes in• Cover as much as you need to• Use the list of topics at the beginning as a

guide