Just...wow.
Very very scary, and not from an environmental standpoint, if you read the whole article.
"Which brings me to you, or rather to all of your soldered devices that are two years old or less. Most of these are now assembled using solder joints that have no lead in an effort to save our groundwater and our health. The fact that the lead has been generally replaced with silver or bismuth, both of which are actually greater health risks than lead, well we'll leave that one for Ralph Nader if he decides not to run for President. The longer-term trend is toward all-tin connections, anyway, but they don't work very well, either."
-I, Cringely
http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/2008/pulpit_20080221_004346.html
"Which brings me to you, or rather to all of your soldered devices that are two years old or less. Most of these are now assembled using solder joints that have no lead in an effort to save our groundwater and our health. The fact that the lead has been generally replaced with silver or bismuth, both of which are actually greater health risks than lead, well we'll leave that one for Ralph Nader if he decides not to run for President. The longer-term trend is toward all-tin connections, anyway, but they don't work very well, either."
-I, Cringely
http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/2008/pulpit_20080221_004346.html