Dreaming of a Green(er) Christmas

November 25, 2008

Let's face it. If you really wanted to make "green" choices this Christmas when it comes to purchases of fancy gadgets and gizmos, you'd look around and just admit that you have enough. Just say no. You don't need a newer cell phone, a second mp3 player, or a 52-inch plasma screen television. Bah, humbug, I know. It isn't going to go down that way. But that doesn't mean you and I can't try to be a bit greener this holiday season. And so, Greenpeace gives you Version 10 of its "Guide to Greener Electronics." It takes 18 computer, game console, cell phone and television makers to task, rating them on a set of criteria that are part of Greenpeace's Toxic Tech campaign. From Greenpeace:

Companies are scored on disclosure of their greenhouse gas emissions, commitment for absolute cuts in their own emissions and support for the mandatory global emissions reductions that are needed to tackle climate change. On energy efficiency, a selection of each company’s product range is assessed to see how far they exceed the current de-facto global standard, the US Environmental Protection Agency’s Energy Star. Energy Star sets minimum standards for energy efficiency for many types of electronic products. The overall percentage of renewable energy in a companies total energy use is also assessed.   

Electronic, or e-waste, is something this blog has tackled before. Top score (6.9 out of 10, Greenpeace notes, isn't all that great, but...) goes to Finnish cell phone maker Nokia. The company's phones still contain plenty of different materials that don't break down in the environment, but it got high marks for its voluntary take-back program, which includes more than 5,000 collection points in some 124 countries for phones deemed to be at the end of their lives. Also, Nokia phone chargers exceed Energy Star requirements. Looking at the graphic above (and you can click on the image for a larger version), I'm feeling ever so slightly smug that I'm packing a Nokia N-95, and not an iPhone.

But then again, I will admit that I'm jonesing for a Nintendo Wii these days. Ouch, Nintendo, the report notes "remains in last place with a pitiful .8 points out of 10, scoring zero on all e-waste criteria." Maybe Chris and Andy over at Powrtalk, or Alyssa over at Super Duper Sustainable Stuff can tell me how many trees I need to plant to offset a Wii purchase?

I bet I'm in for a lot of digging....

(Screengrab from the Greenpeace website)

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Comments

[Seg]

Two points.

The grain of salt needed to be placed with the Greenpeace report is that it only tracked official disclosures. It does not account for undisclosed practices, nor does it do a good job vetting the claims made by companies. Previously Nintendo received a zero for not returning Greenpeace phone calls. There's some good points made by this report, but I wouldn't call it compressive nor fully accurate.

A separate point and not taken into account are efforts in downloadable content of games. It's extremely green to distribute games though the Internet than disc. No disc and packaging to make. No crates of product to move across the globe. Inexpensive and green.

(Note: I'm very biased about downloadable games as it's part of what I do for a living.)