The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency recently started a joint program with the Green Electronics Council, called the Electronic Environmental Assessment Tool (EPEAT), to rate the environmental performance of desktops, laptops, and monitors. The Apple MacBook Pro is the highest rated product, which is interesting considering all the grief Apple has gotten recently from Greenpeace. Although targeted more at corporate users, many of the products rated are available for the “average joe.”
I think this is analogous to Energy Star but it is clear there is more work to be done. For instance, digging a little deeper, I realized that companies can get more “points” by just providing manufacturing specifications. I do think this could prove to be a useful tool for informing consumers of the environmental criteria of electronic products.
According to the EPEAT website:
EPEAT includes a set of environmental criteria and a system for identifying and verifying products meeting the criteria. The standard includes 23 required criteria and 28 optional performance criteria in the following eight categories:
1. Reduction/Elimination of Environmentally Sensitive Materials
2. Materials Selection
3. Design for End of Life
4. Life Cycle Extension
5. Energy Conservation
6. End of Life Management
7. Corporate Performance
8. Packaging
According to the EPA,
EPA has estimated that over the next five years, purchases of EPEAT registered computers will result in reductions of:
– More than 13 million pounds of hazardous waste
– More than 3 million pounds of non-hazardous waste
– More than 600,000 MWh of energy – enough to power 6 million homes
I knew purchasing my Dell 24” widescreen monitor was the right thing to do. According to EPEAT, my Dell 2407WFP widescreen monitor is rated “Silver” in terms of environmental performance.
Sat, Oct 7, 2006
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