A certified electronics recycler is an invaluable partner to any managed service provider. Our work involves sourcing, maintaining, repairing and repurposing technology for our clients. We do everything within our power to keep your tech working for you, as long as possible. But when that last day comes and those machines inevitably need replacement, where do they go? You hand them to us, and we prepare them for their next destination: Green Century Recycling. In honor of Earth Day this month, we took the time to visit Green Century Recycling and catch up with owner and founder, Chris Regis.

Chris is exactly the kind of man you’d expect to find sitting at the juncture of something as cool as tech and as sincere as environmentalism. Raised in Utah with a fierce love of the outdoors, ending up a Portland business owner and recycler by trade was neither the plan nor a total surprise. He is out to make the world better, and Green Century ended up being his path to do just that.

Chris founded his business in 2008, as a new dad. He started with a 1500 sq ft warehouse in Tigard and the newly passed Oregon House Bill 2626, which established a new system (and fund) for the recycling of electronics.  Chris remembers, “My first client – which I still have until this day – I got them, they and filled my warehouse. I started dismantling and refurbishing stuff, started reading, really schooling myself about commodities…” He did it all. He drove the truck, he wiped and prepped the machines, he extracted copper, gold, and other components. He looked for guidance and found little. “2008 – 2012, 2013, this was the wild west. There [was] no state regulation, no federal regulation.”

Chris decided, of his volition, to become a certified electronics recycler. His accreditation is through Sustainable Electronics Recycling International, a globally recognized organization known for their rigorous standards of responsible recycling, ethical data deletion, and safe workplaces. “We do the R2v3 certification because its best practice,” he explains. Back in 2009, though, it offered him so much more. “These certifications gave me operating procedures, instruction sets, they gave me clear aspects, impacts, risks to look out for a long the way. It was a real way for me to learn the circuits – where we expose ourselves to not only environmental infractions but data breaches. I really used [it] to prescribe best practices to my staff and then instruction sets to our clients, on how we are handing their material.”

Armed with his new knowledge and a strong belief earth is all of ours to steward, Chris built a business.  “In the first five years I doubled, in the next five years I doubled again.” He smiles.  “Just kinda trying to figure out better ways to grow. Keeping family at the forefront. Keep the good employees as long as I can keep em, pay ‘em as much as I can pay ‘em – try and maintain the same course.”

Chris’s professional mantra comes up multiple times in our discussion: “There is no away.” It first comes up when asked how much of an average truck is recyclable and how much is trash. “I try and stay away from ever using the word trash – ‘trash’ assumes this magical thinking that you can ‘throw it away’ and ‘away’ is somewhere – ” he gestures wildly towards the windows, the street outside, the world beyond. “Its not. ‘Away’ is a physical location, with an address, and” he points sharply, “its right over there.”

The answer to the original question, by the by, is that on average Green Century can refurbish and remarket 30% of what they collect, and they recycle the entire remaining 70%, a number that Chris is (rightly) very proud of. Their averages were once about 30% reused, 40% recycled, and 30% garbage, but Chris has pushed his team to keep expanding what they are able to process. Green Century can now handle paper, cardboard, Styrofoam, solar units, and universal waste. “When I look at a truck now, this is a lot of what I see.” He points at individual items, one by one, in an invisible truck bed. “I know how I’m going to recycle this AV equipment, I’m going to tear this down, this is going to go metal, this is going to go into low grade circuit board, I’ll get this metal out of it, and this will be the byproduct.”

When one thinks of environmental activists, the mental images conjured are often of trees, clean rivers, and groups of kids picking up trash. It can be hard to make the mental jump to the laptops on our desk, or the phones in our pockets.  But it’s a jump we all need to get comfortable making, according to Chris. “The confluence between tech and earth is probably bigger than any other industry I can think of offhand, with the exception of the beverage industry,” Chris says. “The reason is the amount resources that it takes to manufacture new technology, coupled with the fact that the manufacturers obsolete this technology before it need to be. When I started the average lifespan of a telephone was 36 months. The average life span of a cell phone now is less than 18 months. The amount of resources [used] has slightly declined, but not at the same rate.”

If this feels overwhelming, that’s because it is. It’s a big problem and one we all should take part in tackling. This is where relationships like the one between Green Century and SpitzerTech come in. “If you have your technology companies aware, then they can train their customers. You guys are out, helping people along the way, in that field, [answering questions] of ‘What is technology? How is technology changing? How is technology affecting my life?’. That is one of the top questions people ask technology. We should also remember to ask the question, ‘How is technology affecting my life, poorly?’ And the answer is – at the end of its life. It’s affecting your air, land and water.”

There is a reason there are three arrows on the recycling symbol, all working together. As technological consultants, we can help our clients reduce their new purchases and reuse what tech they already have. We need Chris and Green Century to complete the recycle. Chris appreciates the way our two organization’s missions work together. “With companies like SpitzerTech, companies that have trusted confidence, their clients trust them. Your clients hire you to handle the backbone of their business. They TRUST you. So they’ll also trust you when you’re talking to them about the final disposition of material.”

Chris ends the discussion by coming back once more to his mantra. “There is no magical ‘away.’” Again, the gesture, encompassing a space that does not exist. “We all have to take responsibility at the time of purchase, and then we should all have this sense of pride about what we don’t put in our garbage can. We all have to share the world.”

You can shop the refurbished electronics marketplace at Green Century anytime. Their inventory is always changing and who knows – maybe you’ll run into some of your favorite SpitzerTech engineers while you’re there.