According to Greenpeace, e-waste today represents 5 % of the world's municipal waste stream that is approximately 50 million tons per year. These numbers are going to get bigger, according to Greenpeace. Per year in Europe e-waste levels are growing approximately 3-5 %. In the next five years e-waste levels are expected to triple.

According to Greenpeace by 2010 there will be 178 million new computer users in China and 80 million new users in India alone.This is manly due to that people hanging on to the same gadgets are getting less. In 1997 the average lifespan of computers was six years; in 2005 it was only two years, Cnn reports. According to a recent article by the UK's Observer newspaper, average lifespan of a mobile phone now is just 18 months.

The reason for increase in dumping the e-waste has not so much to do with flaws in the hardware itself, but more to do with the software that is running the machines, Cnn reports.