Apple Goes Back To EPEAT 225
An anonymous reader writes with a followup to news from last weekend that Apple had turned its back on the EPEAT hardware certification standard. After hearing criticism from customers, the media, and governmental organizations that Apple wasn't being environmentally friendly, the company's Hardware Engineering VP, Bob Mansfield, wrote today that its earlier decision was a mistake, and all of Apple's eligible products are back on EPEAT. (EPEAT welcomed Apple back with open arms.) Mansfield repeated an earlier statement from Apple that EPEAT does not measure all the ways in which the company's products are environmentally friendly. Mansfield said, "For example, Apple led the industry in removing harmful toxins such as brominated flame retardants (BFRs) and polyvinyl chloride (PVC). We are the only company to comprehensively report greenhouse gas emissions for every product we make, taking into account the entire product lifecycle. And we’ve removed plastics wherever possible, in favor of materials that are more highly recyclable, more durable, more efficient and longer lasting. Perhaps most importantly, we make the most energy-efficient computers in the world and our entire product line exceeds the stringent ENERGY STAR 5.2 government standard. No one else in our industry can make that claim."
Re:Brilliant PR move (Score:5, Informative)
Re: EPEAT caves (Score:5, Informative)
Apple is more green in terms of how it makes (AND recycles) its products than any other major electronics manufacturer.
Given that Apple's credibility has dropped straight through zero into the negative zone, I for one won't be taking that claim at face value.
How do you figure, "Apple's credibility has dropped straight through zero into the negative zone"?
http://www.apple.com/environment/ [apple.com]
http://www.apple.com/environment/faq.html [apple.com]
http://www.apple.com/environment/renewable-energy/ [apple.com]
http://images.apple.com/environment/reports/ [apple.com]
http://images.apple.com/environment/progress/ [apple.com]
http://www.apple.com/supplierresponsibility/reports.html [apple.com]
Find any other vendor with this level of commitment, or even this level of detail on what they're doing with their products on the environment front.
Re:How much did Apple pay EPEAT? (Score:5, Informative)
Apple still has many products that met the EPEAT certification requirements. However, the newer products with glued batteries and screen components do not.
The MacBook Pro with Retina Display has an EPEAT Gold rating - so no, that's not it.
If you're talking about phones and tablets... currently EPEAT doesn't rate them - at all - for any manufacturer.
Re:Brilliant PR move (Score:5, Informative)
Or maybe not so brilliant.
We've recently heard from many loyal Apple customers who were disappointed to learn that we had removed our products from the EPEAT rating system. I recognize that this was a mistake. Starting today, all eligible Apple products are back on EPEAT.
A Letter From Bob Mansfield [apple.com]
The mistake was in ignoring the needs and values of institutional, enterprise, and governmental markets where Apple had been finally making some headway.
Organizations which have policies to require EPEAT compliance include Ford Motor Co., KPMG and Kaiser Permanente, in the private sector, as well as several universities and federal, state and municipal agencies. The U.S. government requires that 95% of the electronics purchased by its agencies be certified by EPEAT.
According to the DOE, environmental benefits of EPEAT purchasing in FY11 included an energy savings of 50 million kilowatt hours and a projected cost savings of $4.8 million.
[David Daoud, research director, PCs and Green IT, at IDC] said Apple is bound to find some resistance from buyers who aren't happy about the decision, but believes it needs only to have "a PR discussion" as to "why they're not being environmental. If you're Apple you have to look at the implications of certifying every single product. As much as I'd love to say it's a bad move, the financial guys are looking at it differently."
EPEAT Customers React to Apple's Withdrawal [informationweek.com]
PR was not enough.
Good troll! (Score:5, Informative)
Too bad the truth is that Apple recycles any of their products for free [apple.com], and any other manufacturer's products [srsapp.com], also for free, and it's all zero-landfill, meaning that image is completely, 100%, provably false.
But again, I know you're trolling — I'm just replying so others following this threat won't have any chance of being duped by any of your posts.
Re:EPEAT caves (Score:3, Informative)
Actually, that's exactly what happened. The Retina MacBook Pro is EPEAT Gold certified. [apple.com] EPEAT's standards have NOTHING to do with "repairability". It has to do with the products being able to be easily disassembled by conventional tools so that the constituent parts can be recycled by any recycler. It's a baseline standard. But Apple recycles all of its products for free, and does not send anything to the landfill. Nothing.
And the simple truth, which you deny because you are either a troll or hate Apple, or both, is that Apple's products (and their datacenters, physical plant operations, etc.) and the entire product lifecycle are more recylcable, made with more recycled and non-toxic content, and more green than any other major electronics manufacturer. That's why you can't respond with facts, just trolls.
Re:Not stupid at all (Score:4, Informative)
1. Hmm, I can open the case on my Mac Pro just fine and replace anything I like. The Retina Macbook Pro is one product out of their lineup, most of which are fairly customer-maintainable. And the materials Apple uses by-and-large lead the industry in environmental friendliness. Surely the Retina MBP is worrisome in terms of signaling a trend, but I hope this backpedaling will also show in their future manufacturing practices.
2. Have you ever known someone who actually threw away their iPhone? Come on. I still have one of the original iPhones, and the battery works just fine. And even if they did decide to throw it away, Apple has a recycling program. To wit: do you know anyone that's still rocking a Treo from the 2000s? Smartphones get passed down via the used market, but eventually they all fall out of favor. At least Apple has a path to sustainable recycling for the product when that time comes. You may disagree with the disposable culture that smartphones and tablet devices bring, but that's a different issue and something that applies industry-wide.
And I can't speak to the sustainability of Apple's headquarters, but California building code requires that commercial building windows be un-openable. At least anything built since the 90's...I'm not quite sure when that code went into effect. I don't know much about green building design, but I would imagine openable windows in a giant air conditioned building would result in a lot of wasted energy. So I'm not sure what your point was there.
p.s. -- I've been making the point lately of not using the word 'consumer'. That's a word made up by corporations to change our relationship to big business. Customer denotes that the business exists to serve us, consumer denotes that we exist to serve the business. I don't like to give that word or that type of business relationship legitimacy.