Environmental groups respond to Apple's green moves

Jonny Evans
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October 06, 2009
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The first green groups have begun responding to Apple’s move to withdraw from the US Chamber of Commerce in protest at that group’s non-green agenda.

Apple last night revealed its immediate withdrawal from the US Chamber of Commerce because of the groups “strident criticism of plans to reduce US greenhouse gas emissions”.

In a letter to the Chamber president, Apple VP, Catherine Novelli said: "Apple supports regulating greenhouse gas emissions, and it is frustrating to find the Chamber at odds with us in this effort."

Since then, Clean Production Action and ChemSec have issued a report that highlights Apple as one of seven companies that lead the pack in terms of eliminating toxic substances from electronic poducts.

The group said: “Apple established an innovative program that restricts the use of nearly all bromine and chlorine compounds across all their product lines. As such, Apple now offers a wide range of PVC and BFR free consumer products including iPhones and iPods, as well as computers that are free of BFRs and most uses of PVC.”

“These seven companies demonstrate that there are less toxic and still cost effective alternatives to substances of high concern that do not compromise performance or reliability,” says CPA Project Director Alexandra McPherson. “They are well positioned to gain competitive advantage in a marketplace and regulatory environment increasingly sensitive to the use of toxic chemicals in consumer products.”

Apple supplier, Seagate is one of the firms also commended for playing its part. It was immediately receptive to Apple’s 2007 demand that suppliers prove their parts don’t use any chlorine or bromine.

Apple hired scientists and despatched other know how to suppliers who required help achieving its targets. More recently, Apple has worked with another company to develop a replacement for PVC, which is understood to become commonplace in use in Apple products during the coming year, BusinessWeek informs.

The company accepted the replacement material would be more expensive than PVC, “Apple is really walking the walk,” a source told the reporter.

Greenpeace sources haven’t yet released a statement on Apple’s latest moves to Green its business, and to encourage US business to do the same.

It’s possible the campaigning group won’t at this stage, as within the last two weeks, the chamber has lost California's biggest utility corporations, Pacific Gas and Electric and Exelon, along with PNM resources, a New Mexico firm. Nike resigned from the commerce executive but remains a member. Two other firms - General Electric and Johnson & Johnson - have issued statements saying that they disagree with the chamber's climate policy.

Meanwhile, Greenpeace has quietly made its ‘Guide to Greener Electronics’ available as a guide which can be read on any phone, including the iPhone.

Comments (13)

Woode (not verified) | October 06, 2009 - 7:58am

even if you truly believe you are on the right side of the argument, and human-caused climate change does not exist, do you really want to be there? Do you want to be up to your eyeballs in melted icecaps as coastal cities flood, if you are wrong? If you are right, but we still pollute less, pump less CO2 into the air, and have a cleaner world, isn't it worth it?

Sure, the new materials are more expensive at first, but as economies of scale kick in, they quickly drop in price anyway -- you see this all the time with technology.

Polluting less and less, in and of itself, is the right thing to do -- for us and our children.

pmsander (not verified) | October 06, 2009 - 8:56am

I tend to be on the side that believes the human presence in the universe is so minute in span and importance that to think we alone can cause significant climate change is extremely egocentric. However, I do agree with your point. Whether I'm right or wrong isn't relevant. Being more conscientious regarding the world we live in is still the right thing to do.

Thanks for posting this.

PZ (not verified) | October 06, 2009 - 9:03am

I really wish people would stop intentionally confusing pollution with climate change. There is no correlation between the two, except for the one driven by propagandists.

We should not be polluting excessively, and new products should aim to reduce the amount of pollution they cause.

That, however, has nothing to do with the planet Earth itself, and only to do with our own health and wellbeing.

People thay say, "the Earth is in jeopardy" are so unimaginably arrogant and wrong, they might well qualify for institutionalization. Believing that the Earth is changing because of man ( or to believe that we could conceivably slow or reverse such an effect if it existed) are equally certifiable...

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | October 06, 2009 - 9:50am

If the mac wasn't the best computer on the market, I'd love to drop them for their eco-nonsense posturing.

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | October 06, 2009 - 10:49am

I think you are the one confused. CO2 is not pollution. However, that is one of the main targets for the bill in question.

pmsander is right. Reducing CO2 also means reducing energy consumption and increasing efficiency. It is the right thing to do. It reduces our dependency on foreign oil and also reduces pollution caused by burning coal.

I know it is a tall order, but if we could replace coal as one of our energy sources with solar, that alone would solve the problem.

Vaganza (not verified) | October 06, 2009 - 1:06pm

Yes, My CFL light bulb consumes less energy at my end, but requires more energy to produce than a traditional incandescent bulb, and my CFL also contains mercury. And so far I have not seen an improvement on the length of bulb life, My CFL burns out at the same rate my Incandescent bulbs did. I don't understand how you can refer to something as a pollutant when such a large percentage of everything on the entire planet is made from it, and people need to understand that the largest percentage (75-85%) of greenhouse gas in the atmosphere is H20; not CO2. This is because 3/4 of the planet's surface is covered in water. Everyone has focused on CO2 emissions increasing 22% from 0.0324% of total atmosphere to 0.038%, has anyone followed the change in water vapor? and they have only been measuring this for the past 30 years... so the sample isn't exactly indicative of what has happened within anthropological history let alone geological history. Proof has been shown that the planet has been far warmer than this as well as far colder. A 30 year sample isn't enough for me to believe any
direct correlation, it looks more like coincidence. I do believe there is a massive money grab going on right now, and I have worked long enough in the green industry to see it, I have been in meetings where it has been discussed, for instance, selling items with recycled content at a higher price, when it indeed costs less to use recycled content. Most of the steel used in the world for the passed 50 years is produced from recycled content, because it costs less.

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | October 06, 2009 - 10:51am

and tell me we can do nothing to effect the earth

then look at the long term effects of those mines, the poising of our water

ya certifiable and backed up by peer reviewed research

Semi Noob (not verified) | October 06, 2009 - 1:48pm

Nothing noble is happening here. Your uneducated heart strings are crafting the most debilitating tax program (that Al Gore will be PERSONALLY collecting) that man has ever endured. Just like income tax of the 16th Amendment. It was an IQ test that everyone failed. Tax the rich! Yeah, the rich has already written the tax code to protect themselves. You're doing it again. Creating a carbon tax. Please, find an H1N1 vaccine before you live any longer.

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | October 06, 2009 - 3:25pm

"Please, find an H1N1 vaccine before you live any longer."
... There is a H1N1 vaccine allready....

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | October 06, 2009 - 10:39am

Surprise. Yes, we really can affect the planet. The Antarctic ozone hole correlated with the use of CFCs. Its gradual recovery correlates with the elimination of their use. See http://www.theozonehole.com/

Don't forget the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, an island of our crap in the middle of the Pacific ocean twice the size of Texas. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Pacific_Garbage_Patch .

We also may have created a new kind of cloud: Noctilucent clouds, caused by a buildup of particles at the edge of space. There in no record of their existence before 1885. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noctilucent_cloud

I'm interested in facts and measured observations, not uninformed opinion and wild ass guessing. If sea level is rising because ice is melting, that means temperature is going up. Did we do all of it? Maybe, or maybe we helped a little. We certainly pump out quite a bit of CO2 every year and it has to go somewhere. Even if everything we do is completely absorbed and has no effect whatsoever (which is not true, as we can and do measure increasing amounts of man made particulates in the atmosphere), I don't want to be breathing this stuff. I don't want my kids breathing this stuff. Do you ever go to a forest and be surprised by what fresh air really smells like? That's pretty sad.

ulfoaf | October 06, 2009 - 10:47am

I hate Apple getting involved in politics. I hated them posting Al Gore on their web page for his "contributions." Carbon dioxide is not a pollutant. A greenhouse gas, yes. Anyone who doesn't think pinning all the blame on global temperature increases isn't rife with politics should read Michael Crichton's "State of Fear." It is fictional, but he looked at a lot of real evidence, included in the book. His conclusion is that there is no conclusion to make - plenty of contradictory evidence.

If Apple doesn't want to pollute, they have control over it. Nothing wrong with using safe materials in their products, but I suspect most of it is PR bull anyway. They make their products in China! A country well known for little care for worker safety or whether the products they make are actually safe, let alone nonpolluting.

Semi Noob (not verified) | October 06, 2009 - 1:33pm

For all of you who haven't done a seconds worth of research, but consider your ticket stub to Al Gore's bullshit movie - An Inconvenient Truth as scientific knowledge, here's the TRUTH: CO2 comprises .054% of the Earth's entire greenhouse gas layer. Meaning, only .054% of the everything that makes you warm is CO2 based. OF THAT, man can only contribute at the HIGHEST estimate, 9% of that .054%. To make it even easier for those of you that dropped out of math in 8th grade, and are for global carbon taxation, take a penny, chop it up into 540 pieces (yeah, good luck) then take 9% of that impossibly small sliver. THAT is the ONLY contribution man has to the heating of the world. STOP BEING MORONS. You are serving the global bankers who want to tax our civilizations into the stone age. It's okay to be had by these folks once, but when presented the FACTS, you have no excuse but to educate yourself. Look up the film "The Great Global Warming Swindle" aired on BBC5. There are free links out there. Watch and LEARN. Head professor at MIT. Top two scientist at NASA. Founder of GREENPEACE, all know it's a lie.

9to5Mac Noob (not verified) | October 06, 2009 - 6:40pm

Im very disappointed, having read this thread in the environmental discussion, and also the creationism forum, to discover that the most outspoken people on either topic are so frequently idiots.

No, you cannot use the world as a self-healing and infinite resource, you need to care for it.

Creationist, or evolutionist, the planet we are on is all we got, so we got to look after it.

There is no god, or, if there is, the best the creationists can do is he disguised himself as random chance, which is the same thing.

If there is no god, and we are hurting our planet, then there is no pointy-hatted Gandalf to come save us.

There never have been before, with the exception of the sundry pre-internet 'prophets' we bought up from time to time.

There is no god, no meaning and no higher power. Even god gives us choice, and godlessness gives us the same choice.

Do we live or die, and do we care about the planet? And if we do care, do we leave it to our children's children to sort out, or do we start now?

There is a story. An old story I think. It is about a man, a mountain and a village. In winter the village had no way to get to the nearest city. This made winter very bad, and the village hard to live in. In that village there lived an old man. One day he went out from the village carrying a spoon. He humped into a young man, who said to the old, "Where are you going", to which the old man replied, I am going to move the mountain. Of course, the young man replied, "how", so the old man showed him the spoon he carried. The young man said, "Old man, it will take you many lifetimes to move the mountain with that spoon..." The old man replied:

"I know, I know, but somebody has to start."

So start, and stop arguing about faith and superstition. We should surely have been working to make a better world since the day mankind realised it should.

Get on with it, or get used to what's coming.

There isn't much more in the way of choice.

Particularly when most who are holy or unholy know, prayer is simply masturbation when god, or yourself, calls you to action.

Mind if we get on with making it all a bit better now?