Joseph Kim, Yaw Amoyaw-Osei and Calah Lambertson

These people are standing on piles of e-Waste on top heavy metal contaminated soil, breathing in sewage gases and toxic odors from the river behind them.... so why are the smiling ???

Particulates, acid gases, metals, PAHs,

You do not want to stand in this ground plume.

e-Waste workers burning copper wires (YIKES !!!)

This is the riskiest task and the one that Greenpeace reported on in 2008. After dismantling a computer for recoverable parts, the bundles of copper wires are burned to strip off plastic covering. No one buys copper wires with the sheathing attached so they must get the plastic off. We also sampled these workers.

Follow the smoke....

The steps: buying waste computers, breaking, dismantling, sorting, copper wire collection, then BURNING.....

That Calah knows her sampling pumps

Problems always arise in worker sampling, luckily Calah handled them quickly and efficiently. Well done....

e-Waste workers

Well it's happening. With the help of Ghana Health Service, EPA, Green Advocacy and the Agbogbloshie Market Associate we equipped our study participants with sampling devices for Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons, Volatile Organic Compounds, Total Suspended Particulates, Heavy Metals and Acid Gases and sent them out to do their thing. But since this recyclers market is 95% Muslim Ghanians (from the north) we had to accommodate Friday prayers.

Joe needs help from Calah (or is it the other way aound??)

Now what did Prof. Caravanos say we should do with this hose?