在奧斯汀的一個工業園區里，藏著一棟沒有任何標志的建筑，你甚至在蘋果地圖上都找不到這個地方。然而在這里，蘋果公司的一個采用了最新技術的機器人正在熱火朝天地工作著。只見在一個玻璃罩子里，幾條自動機械臂正在圍著一條傳送帶快速而精準地上下左右揮舞著。玻璃罩內的溫度可低至零下112度，機械臂在這種極低溫度下作業，使它的周邊升起了一團霧氣。幾名穿著藍色實驗服、頭戴護目鏡的技術人員在旁邊觀察著機械臂的工作情況。除了機器運轉時發出的低沉的嗡嗡聲，還不時傳來機械敲擊的砰砰聲。

這套復雜的系統名叫Daisy，它結合了人力指令和自動技術，給蘋果帶來了它一直孜孜以求的結果——從報廢的iPhone上拆解塑料、金屬和玻璃，用于二次利用。蘋果的環境政策和社會事務副總裁麗莎·杰克遜表示：“我們在工程上花了很多時間，以確保我們的設備能夠運轉起來。研發Daisy的目的，就是確保我們可以有一種有效且高效的方法來拆解產品。”

In an unmarked building tucked away in an industrial park in Austin, a location so secret it doesn’t appear on Apple Maps, one of Apple’s latest technologies is hard at work. Inside glass casing, automatic robotic arms move left, right, up, down, and around a conveyor belt with speed and precision. A couple of technicians in blue lab coats, safety goggles, and gloves watch as fog—created by the glassed-in chamber’s extreme cold, which can drop to –112 degrees—billows around one of the arms. Loud mechanical pounding breaks the low hum of running machinery with a uniform thump, thump, thump.

This complicated system, called Daisy, combines automation and a human touch to give Apple its coveted result: scraps of pure plastic, metal, and glass from otherwise-unusable iPhones. “We spend a lot of time in the engineering, making sure our devices stay together,” says Lisa Jackson, Apple’s vice president of environment, policy, and social initiatives. “Daisy was about making sure we had an efficient and effective way to ?disassemble products.”

作為一個能夠將電子設備拆解到極致的機器人，Daisy不僅代表了電子產品回收領域內的一個突破，同時也描繪出了蘋果在盡力縮小環境影響上的路線圖。蘋果對自己在環保領域里的成績還是頗為自得的。現在，它的供應鏈中有相當一部分比例使用的是可再生能源。現在，它又把注意力轉向了一個同樣棘手的問題——數量越來越龐大而且有毒有害的廢棄電子設備零件。

蘋果在2017年曾經宣稱，公司的終極目標，是要使用可回收或可再生材料制造它的全部產品——而且是只使用可回收和可再生材料。不過至于什么時候能實現這個目標，蘋果并未給出時間表。（顯然不會很快實現。）不過這棟建筑，也就是今年4月剛剛投入使用的蘋果材料回收實驗室，就是蘋果開展相關實驗的地方。蘋果將從這里起步，一步步朝它的終極目標邁進。

Daisy represents not only a breakthrough in electronic recycling efforts—robotically pulling apart an electronic device piece by piece—but also a road map to minimizing environmental impact. Apple prides itself on its green credentials; a high proportion of its supply chain, for example, is powered by renewable energy. Now it’s turning its attention to an equally thorny problem: the fast-growing, often toxic detritus of discarded electronic gear.

Apple in 2017 announced a goal of eventually making all of its products from recycled or renewable material—and eventually, only such material. Apple can’t say when that will happen. (It won’t be soon.) But this building, the Material Recovery Lab, which opened in April, is where the company is doing the research that it hopes will get it there.

電子垃圾涵蓋的范圍很廣，除了報廢的手機，還有傳真機和智能手表等等。如今，電子垃圾管理已經成為了一個越來越復雜的問題。來自于全球電子垃圾監測機構的數據顯示，2016年，全球共產生了4400萬噸電子垃圾，足夠蓋起4500個埃菲爾鐵塔。

包括消費電子產品在內的家用電子垃圾，只是電子垃圾總數的一小部分。來自于羅徹斯特理工學院戈利薩諾可持續發展研究所的數據顯示，去年全球的家用電子垃圾總量約為160萬噸（約合35億磅）。戈利薩諾可持續發展研究所的副教授卡利·巴比特認為，隨著各大科技公司相繼推出更小、更精致的電子產品，電子垃圾的總量實際上是在減少的，但同時新的問題也在出現。她表示：“我們現在使用的電子產品，依賴于越來越復雜的稀土材料和貴金屬的混合。”而隨著企業推出新產品的速度越來越快，就算有了自動化的拆解回收系統，也難以跟上人們丟棄電子垃圾的速度。

Managing e-waste, a category that spans thrown-away equipment from fax machines to smartwatches, is becoming an increasingly complex problem. In 2016 the world generated 44 million metric tons of e-waste, according to the Global E-Waste Monitor. For perspective, that’s the equivalent of about 4,500 Eiffel Towers.

Household e-waste, including consumer electronics, is a smaller share of the pile; last year it accounted for 1.6 million metric tons, or 3.5 billion pounds, according to the Golisano Institute for Sustainability at Rochester Institute of Technology. Total e-waste mass is actually decreasing as companies release sleeker, smaller products, says Callie Babbitt, associate professor at the Golisano Institute. But there’s a new problem on the rise, she explains: “The products we’re using now are relying on an increasingly complex mix of rare-earth materials and precious metals.” And as companies put out new products at an increasingly rapid pace, even automated systems may struggle to keep up.

蘋果公司拒絕估計自己造成的電子垃圾總量。去年蘋果一共賣出了2.177億部iPhone手機，按平均一部手機5盎司的重量估算，這意味著光是通過手機，蘋果就向全球消費者輸送了大約6800萬磅的物料。如果消費者沒有更好的回收或者處理方案，很多iPhone最終必然會成為電子垃圾。

杰克遜表示，Daisy代表著蘋果公司朝著它的環保目標邁出了“關鍵的一步”。在加盟蘋果前，她曾經擔任美國環保署署長一職達五年之久。Daisy于去年正式問世，它可以拆解iPhone 5以上的15款不同型號的iPhone手機，每小時可拆解200臺。今年4月以來，蘋果通過“以舊換新”計劃，已經回收了大約900萬臺iPhone手機。蘋果的兩臺Daisy機器人（另一臺在荷蘭）正在拆解回收其中的100萬臺舊手機。

Apple declines to estimate the size of its own e-waste footprint. The company sold 217.7 million iPhones last year: At an average of about five ounces a phone, that means Apple put about 68 million pounds of materials into households worldwide through phones alone, some of which will eventually become waste if consumers lack a better option.

Daisy represents a “crucial step” toward Apple’s goals, says Jackson, who spent five years leading the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency before joining Apple. The robot, which debuted last year, can disassemble 15 different iPhone models (from the iPhone 5 up) at a rate of 200 devices per hour. The machine at the Austin lab and another in the Netherlands together are processing about 1 million of the 9 million iPhones collected since April through Apple’s trade-in program. (Most of the others are refurbished and resold.)

蘋果公司表示，公司希望最終對產品中使用的14種材料做到完全回收。其中之一是塑料，因為它需要數百年的時間才能夠分解，因而會對野生動物構成威脅，而且它在降解的過程中還會釋放出有害的毒素。另一種材料是鋰，主要使用在可充電電池中，鋰礦的開采會對環境造成嚴重破壞。在Daisy的幫助下，蘋果公司已經能夠對全部14種材料進行回收利用。目前，它已經開始在MacBook Air等新產品中使用回收的錫和鋁等材料。

傳統的電子垃圾回收設施并沒有Daisy這么考究。大多數工廠主要依賴于笨重的機器將報廢產品粉碎，然后將碎片一股腦地倒進一個容器里。這些混合物更加難以回收，而且有些零部件會在這個過程中丟失或者損毀。杰克遜表示，蘋果不僅希望改進自己的回收流程，還希望改進全行業的回收方式。在蘋果在奧斯汀的回收設施中，有一部分也致力于一般電子垃圾回收技術的研發，從而通過技術創新，使所有回收設施都能夠回收更多的材料，改進消費科技的供應鏈。

Apple lists 14 materials used in its products that it hopes to eventually fully recycle. One is plastic, which takes hundreds of years to decompose, poses a threat to wildlife, and can release harmful toxins as it corrodes. Another is lithium, found in rechargeable batteries, the mining of which takes a heavy toll on the environment. With help from Daisy, the company has been able to recover all 14 elements for recycling; it’s already reusing tin and aluminum for new Apple products like the MacBook Air.

Traditional e-waste recycling facilities are less dainty than Daisy. Most rely on bulky machines to shred products, dumping the output into bins of mixed particles. These mixed streams are much harder to recycle, and some elements get lost, stuck, or tossed out in the process. Jackson says Apple wants to improve not only its own processes but also the broader industry’s mulch-it-all approach. Part of its Austin facility is dedicated to broad ?e-waste recycling R&D, with the hope of developing innovations that will allow all recycling facilities to recover more materials, improving the consumer-tech supply chain.

蘋果的回收目標要想得以實現，必然還有一條很長的路要走，同時也需要行業各方的共同努力。杰克遜也表示，就連她自己，一開始也不相信全面回收是可行的。但在與工程師和其他團隊成員交流后，她發現全面回收不僅是可行的，而且是極為必要的。她表示：“如果我們不花時間去做投資，確保硬件可以長期使用，材料可以再次利用，我們就會面臨一個始終無法克服的難題。”（財富中文網）

本文另一版本登載于《財富》雜志2019年9月刊，標題為《未來，你的新手機將由舊手機制成》。

譯者：樸成奎

It’s a long road that will require numerous parts of the industry to get on board if Apple’s goals are to be realized. Even Jackson says she wasn’t initially convinced it was doable. But after talking to engineers and team members, she came to see total recycling as not only possible but also vitally necessary. “If we don’t spend time investing in making sure the hardware is used for a long time and materials are reused,” she says, “it will be a problem we cannot surmount.”

A version of this article appears as part of the Change the World package in the September 2019 issue of Fortune with the headline “Someday, Your New Phone Could Be Made From Your Old Phone.”