Resources, Conservation and Recycling 96 (2015) 61–70 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Resources, Conservation and Recycling jo ur nal home p age: www.elsevier.com/locate/resconrec Full length article A three-stage methodology for initiating an effective management system for electronic waste in Turkey Vildan C ¸ etinsaya Özkır ∗ , Tu˘ gba Efendigil, Tufan Demirel, Nihan C ¸ etin Demirel, Muhammet Deveci, Burak Topc ¸ u Yıldız Technical University, Department of Industrial Engineering, Istanbul, Turkey a r t i c l e i n f o Article history: Received 16 May 2014 Received in revised form 22 January 2015 Accepted 22 January 2015 Available online 12 February 2015 Keywords: e-Waste management system Choquet integral GIS Collection strategy a b s t r a c t Due to both consumption and obsolescence rates of new technology and shorter life cycles of electronic products, the volume of electronic waste (e-waste) is significantly increasing. While managing a great amount of e-waste, government institutions face compelling problems because of the economic and environmental concerns. This study uses a three-stage methodology to initiate the e-waste management activities in context of a collection campaign in Istanbul, explaining the potential benefits and underlying reasons. The problem includes selecting a superior set among a large but finite number of alternatives. Since it is hard to utilize advanced compensatory methods to solve these problems, a three-stage method- ology is proposed for systematically reducing the number of alternatives. In this study, we employ the methodology to determine the locations of collection nodes in Istanbul. The main reason that we select Istanbul, is the requirement of an urgent intervention to deal with the large quantities of e-wastes. The result of this study will strongly assist the authorities to configure well-structured strategies for future e-waste management system. © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction The global consumer electronics market is the fastest grow- ing market around the world. Some electronic products, such as mobile phones and laptops, become outdated before its expected life ends. Any innovative challenge expedites the consumption of these products and causes an exponentially increasing elec- tronic waste problem. Since an electronic waste includes both precious and toxic materials, it is economically and environmen- tally important to minimize the negative environmental effects and to maximize the positive outcome by recycling valuable ingredi- ents, simultaneously. This study proposes an e-waste collection campaign for Istan- bul by explaining the potential benefits and underlying reasons. The main reason for selecting Istanbul depends on requirement of recovery processes regarding its demographics and infrastruc- tural systems. Demographics are concerned with the great amount of population, high penetration rate, higher education level and high-income level of its residents. Young and rapidly growing ∗ Corresponding author. Tel.: +90 2123832903. E-mail addresses: vildanozkir@gmail.com, cvildan@yildiz.edu.tr (V. C ¸ etinsaya Özkır). population have a great demand for new technologies causing the higher utilization rate of the technological devices and a huge quantity of e-waste, which is generated at the end of use. Hence, city planners should build an integrated system including proper collecting, recycling and discard/reuse processes as stated in EU Directives. Directive 2012/19/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 4 July 2012 on waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) emphasize the necessities for a separate e-waste collection system. Directive defines “separate collection” as a precondition for ensuring specific treatment and recycling of WEEE and is nec- essary to achieve the chosen level of protection of human health and the environment. For this purpose, it states that convenient facilities should be set up for the return of WEEE, including public collection nodes, where private households should be able to return their waste at least free of charge. Distributors have an impor- tant role in contributing to the success of WEEE collection. In this context, collection nodes could be set up at retail shops for very small WEEE, which should not be subject to the registration or per- mit requirements of Directive 2008/98/EC. City planners/directors should settle systems in order to minimize the disposal of WEEE as unsorted municipal waste. They should inform their residents to achieve a high level of separate collection of WEEE by adopting appropriate training programs and legislations. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.resconrec.2015.01.008 0921-3449/© 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.