A red apple is sweet, but not every apple is red
According to a Greenpeace report on how different tech companies rank environmentally, Apple ranks lowest in removing toxic chemicals from its products and adopting recycling policies. Said toxic chemicals, it is claimed, end up in scrap yards in Asia where they contaminate child laborers and the environment.
To turn this Apple green, Greenpeace have started the Green my Apple campaign. The site contains a lovely play on Apple’s recent ad campaign, plus some bites of mock keynotes.
Also … previous episodes.
January 29th, 2007 at 12:56 pm
Although Apple could be doing more, overall they are still one of the better companies. Greenpeace are not being completely honest - I’ve heard that they’ve admitted off the record that they are making an example of Apple because they think Apple are more likely to act to save their ‘good guy’ reputation, and that the computing industry follows whatever Apple does.
The USA’s Sierra Club and Environmental Protection Agency rate Apple as very good, although this is of course relative to the industry as a whole.
(I can’t find the links for this at the moment)
I hope Apple improve the greeness of their hardware, but I think Greenpeace are being unfair.
January 30th, 2007 at 8:55 am
Well, they may be making an example of Apple, but admittedly their non-recycled hardware sticks-out-like-a-sore-thumb on those Asian waste dumps.
Apple also has very strong branding, which makes them easy to identify, and thus a good target.
Greenpeace are being slightly unfair, they are making sure that we know that children are being exposed to the dangers of all this dumping, where as it really effects everyone, so they are playing the emotional heart-strings. Greenpeace also make statements like “even Bill Gates is greener” which I don’t think is a fair comparison.
As for how good Apple’s environmental record stands, their machines are very energy efficient, or at least they have been, but it is fairly obvious from the data that they need to rethink the life cycle of their machines. You can say they are one of the better companies, and in the great scheme of things they are, but they are far from being saintly, and these are real problems.