Sustainable electronics
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Sustainable electronics are electronic products made with no toxic chemicals, recyclable parts, and reduced carbon emissions during production. "Sustainability is still very new, emerging business concept. Because of that, we lack uniform guidelines or standards applicable per industry sector that can help companies establish best practices."[1]
Many hazardous chemicals and materials are used in the production of electronics. These substances are further outlined in this page about electronic waste substances.
No brand in 2014 had completely eliminated use of phthalates, beryllium, antimony, BFRs, and PVC in their productions, but Nokia and Motorola have the best track record by eliminating 3 out of 5 above mentioned chemicals.[2]
Brands
According to Rank a Brand Electronics Green Fair Ranking Report in 2014, none of the electronic brands met all of their green requirements for level A. The only company to reach level B was Fairphone, who met 60% of their standards. Level C was awarded to Apple and Nokia with 45% and 40% respectively.[2] The majority of the researched electronic brands were put into level D. These brands include Sony, Acer, Dell, HP, Samsung, Motorola, Philips, Blackberry, Lenovo, Toshiba. They met less than 35% of the Rank a Brand criteria.[3] Rank a Brand generalizes their findings into 4 main categories: reporting on sustainability, climate protection, ecology, and fair labor. All brands report on sustainability. Nokia is the top brand for climate protection, and Fairphone is the top brand for both ecology and fair labor. Apple, although criticized for their sustainability efforts, is a strong second in all of these categories apart from ecology.[4]
| Brand | Label |
|---|---|
| - | A |
| Fairphone | B |
| Apple, Nokia | C |
| Sony, HP, Acer, Samsung, Dell | D |
| LG, ASUS, ZTE, HTC, Microsoft, | E |
Companies who receive an E label are stamped with Electronic Greenwashing Alert, which means that consumers can not clearly find or understand their sustainability information and might find themselves confused or misguided.[2]