26 October
2006 - London, United Kingdom — We here at Greenpeace
pride ourselves in getting into places we're not
supposed to be, like nuclear power plants and
weapons test sites. So it really, really hurts
to get kicked out of something like the Mac Expo
-- where we had permission to attend! All we want
is better environmental policies from Apple: is
that so heretical that we get thrown out?
Our volunteers had set up a
stall to sign up fellow Mac fans in the effort
to get Apple to go green. We handed out some flyers.
We handed out some organic green apples. We talked
to lots of cool people about how uncool it was
for Apple to be neglecting their environmental
impact.
As Tom Dowdall writes over on
the Making Waves blog, "most visitors were
very interested and showed support for the campaign
by signing up online or writing to Steve. But
it seems other exhibitors where not so happy."
Iza Kruszewska, Greenpeace International
campaigner at the expo, says "Apple should
be a world leader in the greening of the electronics
industry, not lagging behind." Why would
we expect anything less of the world's coolest
company?
Bottom of the barrel
Apple scored 11th place (out
of 14) on a ’Guide to Greener Electronics’ recently
released by Greenpeace, with a poor showing on
almost all criteria. The company fails to embrace
the precautionary principle, withholds its full
list of regulated substances, provides no timelines
for eliminating toxic polyvinyl chloride (PVC)
and no commitment at all to phasing out all uses
of brominated flame retardants (BFRs). Ok, we
know. That's a lot of letters. Bottom line: Apples
contain poisonous stuff that ends up in China
and India as e-waste, and which other computer
manufacturers have committed to get rid of. When
iPods, Macs and other items in the Apple product
range get thrown away, most get disassembled,
melted, and picked apart by kids with no health
and safety protection. NOT cool.
Apple reports on the amount
of its electronic waste that gets recycled, which
is a good thing. And they do take back computers
in the US for proper recycling. But worldwide,
their policies on taking back products from their
customers are in the back of the pack by industry
standards.
"It’s time for Apple to
use clean components in all of its products and
to provide a free take-back program to reuse and
recycle its products wherever they are sold. We
are challenging the world leader in design to
also be a world leader in environmental innovation.
We challenge Apple to have a product range on
the market by 2007 which is free of the worst
toxic chemicals." says Iza.
The customer is always right.
And the customer wants green.
Now here's the rich part. The
exhibition hall may have kicked Greenpeace out,
but Mac Expo is FULL of people campaigning for
a greener apple. They're called Apple Customers.
To date, more than 155,000 people have visited
the Green my Apple site. Over 1000 blogs are linking
to it. 12,000 Apple fans have written to Steve
Jobs asking him to change Apple's ways.
