Greenpeace Slams Apple For Environmental Record

nandemoari writes "According to a recent advertisement airing on American TV, Apple's new Macbooks (well-received by most technology critics) are 'the world's greenest family of notebooks.' It seems an indication that the Cupertino-based company is increasingly aware of a consumer base that demands green electronics. However, Greenpeace is less than enthused with Apple's overall green performance. In their report (PDF), the environmentalists argue that Apple 'needs to commit to phasing out additional substances with timelines, improve its policy on chemicals and its reporting on chemicals management.'" Ars Technica points out that Greenpeace's research isn't quite up-to-snuff, and it's also worth noting that Greenpeace admitted to targeting Apple for the publicity in the past.

Comments

Does't matter how they are made if they don't last

[Anonymous Coward]

This same thing came up a while ago - and Apple showed they were actually doing more than most to *build* machines in a clean way.

Unfortunately they seem to think that their machines should be replaced every three years, and that no one should bother fixing them if something breaks.

I have a Macintosh PowerBook with a power supply held together by tape. It also needs a new battery, the DVD drive no longer works, and a USB port is dead. The components needed to fix it all cost five times what they would cost for another brand. Well, okay - what they would cost for my ThinkPad.

The Mac is my machine and has not had a hard life. The ThinkPad is a machine I got second hand. It had been a 'loan' machine and shows evidence of some hard treatment. But, unlike the Mac, it all still works.

Even if Apples manufacturing is *clean*, machines that need to be replaced frequently are not green, and I won't be buying another.

Don

Re:Oh no... I'm going to need a bigger shovel

[girlintraining]

... Heh, figures. Truth hurts.