Keynote Highlight: Apple Gets Greener

Posted by: Arik Hesseldahl on January 17

One of the overlooked bits of information from the Jobs keynote was about the environment. Apple has taken a good deal of flack from Greenpeace on the use of two types of hazardous materials – brominated flame retardants (BFRs) and polyvinyl chloride (PVC) in its computers. (Video after the jump.) The circuit boards inside the MacBook Air – at least the ones that come from Apple – contain neither PVCs nor BFRs. These are the chemicals which earned Apple a rather low grade on the Greenpeace Guide to Greener Electronics. I’ve been critical of the Greenpeace guide not for its intent – raising awareness about toxics and putting pressure on companies to stop using them is a good thing in general — but for it’s methodology. Greenpeace, I have argued, grades companies more on what they say they intend versus what they’ve accomplished. (Greenpeace responded to my criticisms here.)This week we saw some real progress on this front from Apple, and even Greenpeace approves, but not without reservations:

”The MacBook Air is a strong entry in the race to build a green PC. As a mercury and arsenic free laptop it exceeds European Standards….and raises the bar for the rest of the industry. The BFR and PVC free printed wiring on the motherboard is a big step forward, but not a first. Sony achieved that last November.”

More. plus the video, after the jump.

When we last heard from Apple on the issue of toxics, Jobs had promised to eliminate them from all Apple products by the end of 2008. The MacBook Air apparently doesn’t contain them. If Apple sticks to its plans, they’ll be gone form the product line up by the end of this year. (I wonder what this implies about product designs for the rest of the year. Hmmm…?)

Jobs also pointed out that the aluminum outer casing is a material that’s rather good for recycling. The display is uses organic light-emitting diodes for it’s backlighting, and is free of mercury and the glass contains no arsenic. Packaging on the product was also reduced, which isn’t something that other companies tend to brag about, but when you think about it, it’s one of those things that in the end can really add to a products environmental impact. If you can ship twice as many computers in the same space, and for roughly the same fuel cost, that’s a good environmental choice. (Me? I have a weird habit of saving my boxes and putting them in storage.)

Curiously, Greenpeace has focused more on toxics, and less on the overall environmental impact of computers. (I wrote about the complexity of the issue, especially as it relates to consumer PCs in September. Computers, in fact all electronics, have a much bigger environmental impact than just the toxics they leak when they end up in a landfill. They consume a lot of energy that puts carbon into the atmosphere and contributes to warming the planet. Big companies and governments have guidelines like E-Peat they can follow that allow them to make informed computer purchases that take into account not only toxics, but energy use, ease of recycling, and manufacturing practices. Consumers however, have no such rating system to help guide their decisions. I think the time is right for the industry to get together and create one.

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