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Our history is the history of computer recycling.

Prior to Advanced Recovery, computer recycling as we know it today didn't really exist. Let us explain...

Humble Beginnings

In 1989 in a small warehouse in Belleville, New Jersey, Eric Buechel began a part time computer parts business using the auto salvage industry as a model. Business went well for the first two years. Yet, 1991 proved to be a difficult year despite a solid client base and incorporation. There were not enough outlets to recycle computer electronics and the cathode ray tube monitors (CRT). He had hoped CRTs contained a silver lining, but unfortunately they seemed to have no value once de-manufacturing was complete. Little did Eric know that an entire recycling industry would grow out of his frustration.

A Strange Discovery

In late 1991 and throughout 1992, Advanced Recovery began research and development to find ways to reuse the materials found in CRT computer monitors. At first, Advanced Recovery couldn't find a single monitor manufacturing company willing to release its material composition for their CRTs. Believing that silver was a chief ingredient to the inside CRT surface, Eric and two family members began to scrape the surface metals from the inside of the cathode ray tube and test them. Tests revealed that the CRT surfaces were aluminum, not silver. So, they began examining the composition of the glass tube inside the CRT with the hope of finding other precious metals.

Initial test results from the tube showed that the glass contained high levels of lead. Another dead end to recycle metals from CRTs. Or was it? Eric suddenly realized that the lead in CRT monitors posed a significant environmental threat. Throwing all of these lead monitors into land fills could create a huge toxic waste problem. And with hundreds of thousands of monitors reaching their end of life cycle with no safe way to dispose of them, Eric identified a brewing environmental crisis. Advanced Recovery then set out to pioneer the first recycling methods to safely encapsulate the lead filled glass in a cost effective way. And they succeeded.

The World is Watching

On April 14, 1993, The New York Times' reporter Steve Lohr and photo journalist Dith Pran, the real life hero from the movie The Killing Fields, wrote a story about Advanced Recovery stating that “this is where all the mainframe dinosaurs come to die.” The story made the front page of the Times. In the coming weeks, the phone rang off the wall at Advanced Recovery. Articles soon followed in Popular Science, Washington Technology, LA Times, Chicago Tribune, and international magazines in Germany, Russia, Italy, Japan and England. Advanced Recovery's story went on the air with NBC, CBS, CNBC, PBS, FOX and CNN. Truckloads of monitors from Wall Street firms and other Fortune 500 companies flowed into Advanced Recovery. An industry was born.

LEADING THE WAY

Since that memorable year of 1991, Advanced Recovery has lead the computer electronics recycling industry both at the state and federal level. Advanced Recovery continues to recover plastics, circuit boards and metals from obsolete electronics with its main focus on CRT recycling and increasing public awareness. In 2002, Advanced Recovery was chosen to help clean up computer equipment after the 9/11 attack. Over 6,000 pallets of equipment were cleaned of asbestos and debris. In 2003, Eric moved to Tennessee to open Advanced Recovery South to service the Southeastern United States. The rest of the story is still being written.

We're environmentalists first.

We're on a mission to save the planet one monitor at a time. Idealistic? Maybe. But we're doing some very practical things in our community to restore the environment in addition to recycling electronics. That's why in 2003, Advanced Recovery began an ambitious project on nearly 250 acres of land in Pleasant Hill, Tennessee to reintroduce the first 250 of 4,000 Black Walnut seedlings that had almost been wiped out of the area. Advanced Recovery also began planting in Panther Valley Garden the first 1,000 of 3,200 Japanese Cherry trees. In 2008, Advanced Recovery is planning their first annual Cherry Blossom Festival. In addition, a 400-tree orchard of Japanese Chestnut trees, a 20-acre man made lake, 25 miles of hiking trails, Paw Paw Trees, Japanese Raison Trees and an Asian Pear orchard. We have also planted five orchards of both exotic fruit-bearing trees and nut-bearing trees, and a wildlife preservation are underway. So, that's our side of the story. But don't take our word for it.

Hear what others are saying.

“The work of Eric Buechel and Advanced Recovery is the kind of enterprise that the government should be helping.”

US Rep. Herb Klein (D-8th Dist.)

“Eric Buechel's business and environmental instincts are on the same path.”

CNN's Brian Nelson

“One very creative gentleman has a high tech-recycling method for cast away computers.”

Eyewitness News, NYC

“Eric Buechel's company is not taking the easy way out.”

FOX Business News

“Recovery companies like Buechel's are poised for the day computer disposal laws are enforced and expanded to include individual consumers.”

The Newark Star-Ledger

“Buechel's company, Advanced Recovery, is an entrepreneurial response to a looming environmental problem: Millions of obsolete computers.”

The Registered-Guard, Oregon

We don't just follow standards. We help set them.

We follow strict EPA guidelines for the recycling of computer and electronics equipment. In fact, an Advanced Recovery North staff member is on the Northeast Sustainable Energy Association's board for asset recovery and demanufacturing. Plus, we're certified by the State of Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation, Division of Solid Waste Management, Hazardous Waste Program #TNR000017947.