Samsung managed to recall nearly all of the Galaxy Note 7 units that it sold last year and is refurbishing a large number of them as the Galaxy Note 7 Fan Edition, but those that can’t be refurbished for any reason will instead have their materials recovered for future use. In total, Samsung is looking to harvest some 157 tons of materials from the phones, including precious and semi-precious metals such as gold and copper. Many components, rather than being reduced to simpler elements and reshaped, can be recovered as-is for reuse. Components like the processor, NAND memory, camera module, and the display panel can theoretically be pulled from the Galaxy Note 7 units and put into new devices.
Samsung will be partnering with both foreign and domestic firms to extract any usable components and elements from the phones, while parts that cannot be put to different uses will either be used to service any Galaxy Note FE models that end up needing repair in the future, or will be disposed of according to strict eco-friendly guidelines. Samsung said that some of the resources pulled from the decommissioned devices will also be sold, but the company’s press release on the matter did not say exactly what parts will be marked for sale, or who the tech giant’s preferred buyers are.
After enduring pointed questions from environmental activists like Greenpeace regarding how it plans to do away with defective Galaxy Note 7 units, Samsung originally gave an answer that didn’t exactly satisfy everybody; the company stated that it would comply with all applicable government regulations in territories where the phone was sold. This not only meant that it could potentially comply with the loose requirements of some government entities regarding recycling, but also that tons of valuable parts could end up in landfills, unused and simply taking up space. Samsung’s comprehensive plan to recycle the devices sounds significantly more eco-friendly than the ambiguous answer it gave a while back regarding the fate of the discontinued phones, and the firm’s newfound commitment to environmental and fiscal responsibility in this matter stands as an assurance that the company is working hard to overcome the public relations blow that it suffered during the recall of the Galaxy Note 7.