Apple Ditches Green Manufacturing Standard for Products

[DSpider]

...punctured the battery "leaking hazardous goo all over." And these are professionals with oodles of experiences, tools, and lab space.

Probably because they were in a hurry. I've seen it myself with PSP's (the famous Pandora battery). Never underestimate the eagerness of an IT geek.

I think Apple did a marketing research and asked people what they thought of environmentally-friendly products. And most of them probably didn't give enough of a sh*t.

Latte-sipping hipsters... unite!

 

[Onus]

Repair-ability and longevity are two characteristics that specifically interest me. Please pardon the buzzwords, but rampant consumerism is not sustainable, in ANY sense. As global economies tank, people aren't going to have the money to keep buying and buying and buying more and more junk. We're running out of resources and people to exploit to make it, and places to exploit to dump it. Maintaining a business on the formerly-successful planned obsolescence/perceived obsolescence model is [fortunately] doomed to failure.

 

[house70]

[citation][nom]husker[/nom]The explanation is really quite simple. Apples products are all about sleek design; love 'em or hate em, the outward appearance of their products has always been a hallmark. In order to achieve the cutting edge look that they are after, and get everything to fit into the chassis and sill function, is tough enough without having to meet another standard for being all modular and "green".[/citation]
In other words, Apple's stance is "frick this green stuff, let your kids deal with it when it comes to it; now we want more money."
Besides, more money means they'll be able to buy themselves out of this planet, right? Plenty of other planets to live on out there, right?
RIGHT?

 

[house70]

[citation][nom]demarest[/nom]Not a big deal really. If I never hear the word "green" again, it will be too soon. I recently upgraded my computer and hand picked parts with lower power consumption. Not because of some insane belief that we as a race can doom or save a planet much larger than all humans that ever existed combined. People who assign a label to the practice of doing something with more efficiency (green) are doing so out of self-righteousness.Speaking of self-righteousness, I take issue with the article's use of "we all know" and "oodles." I hate to say it, but I'm seeing more and more examples of articles on tom's that are not serious journalistic endeavors. That makes me a sad panda.[/citation]
And yet, you chose to do the right thing because... I know I do it because it's the right thing to do, not necessarily the green thing to do.
Funny how people that choose the gas-guzzling vehicles (just an example) and taunt the ones that choose a fuel-efficient vehicle are the same ones that choose to have quite a few children in their ever-growing families. If they don't care about their own kids and the world they leave for them, why would the rest of us?
As for companies that go "green", that's actually more important than individual choices, because their footprint is so much larger than mine or yours. If you choose to make the right choice (even if you hate the word "green"), it still won't make such a great impact as if an entire company does it.

 

[halcyon]

i wasted lots of Money on Apple gear, it was fun. Now I can say I enjoyed their products but will be buying a lot less of them in the future. Guess what? Apple couldn't care less and that's just fine. Its called reality.

 

[QEFX]

Wait Apple manufacturing / products was green? I though it was blood red.

 

[spartanmk2]

EPEAT just isnt "cool" or "stylish" enough to have apples name in their registry.

 

[jay2tall]

Wow Apple, lets make a new standard, "the Apple standard". It's 2012 and all companies should have a moral and ethical responsibility to be as environmentally friendly as possible. As disposable electronics pile up in land fills we will be consumed by trash. Every effort should be made in order to allow materials to be easily recycled. Welcome to the real Idiocracy (movie reference).

Here is my standard. If I can't easily replace the battery, I won't buy it. Plain and simple. I have been in IT my whole life and do most of my own electronic device repairs. If I can't do somethings as simple as a battery replacement on a device, I don't want it. I understand integrating components, but what can you really integrate a power source into? Nothing!

 

[COLGeek]

Seems like Apple has decided to buck the "green trend" for lowering production costs. Given the Apple user base, this direction is sure to tick off many Apple users. Just might be the incentive for them to look elsewhere for their computing needs.

 

[leakingpaint]

Been saying this since the very first iPod - they are not designed to be user friendly for people trying to repair these things. You know how many paper weight iPod's I've dealt with. Another reason not to buy apple

 

[bin1127]

oh yes, no longevity standards. Your iphone 5 will last '5' minutes on idle. double the bottom line by reducing mtbf.

 

[eddieroolz]

Let's see those loyalists defend Apple in this regard now.

 

[jay2tall]

[citation][nom]jacekring[/nom]5) I'm just waiting for the zombie apocalypse. I've stocked up on guns and ammo, just gota wait out the lull before the zombies run amok.[/citation]
YES! Me to... That or until we are all drinking Brawndo, The Thirst Mutilator.

 

[c_herring]

[citation][nom]sundragon[/nom]I'd like to see the recycling programs of Lenovo, Toshiba, Asus, etc...[/citation]While I don't know about those particular companies, but HP sponsors a recycling program at my store for electronics (and we take any brand, including Mac). The thing is, we have to be able to pull the battery for a separate bin, so we can't take things like unibody MacBooks. Re: "since when did special screws stop someone who wanted to open hardware" - since our store needs any random cashier to be able to just pull the battery and bin it appropriately and get right back to work. We're not going to make a project of disassembling an unfriendly machine.

 

[leakingpaint]

lol some apple fan boy has gone and disliked every comment against this decision by Apple hahaha

 

[freggo]

Why am I not surprised... building green cost money, ergo reduces profit margins.
Apple has no idea what corporate responsibility means; they are just a bunch of anti-siocal misfits with very deep pockets; now go and join the Oil 'manufacturers' club!

Thanks for adding yet another reason not to buy or use any of your products.

 

[rooket]

hmm so the hipster computer (which isn't a PC lol ya right whatever) isn't green any longer? go figure...

 

[kinggraves]

[citation][nom]killerclick[/nom]You can say that for every publicly traded company. Shareholders always demand growth and profit. If you had your most profitable year, the next year better continue the trend and be even better or the CEO might be in trouble.[/citation]

If by being in trouble you mean they might be fired and given a severance package that would keep them living comfortably for their entire life on top of having a yearly income that would allow them to live comfortably for their entire life then yes they would surely be in trouble. First world problems.

Leave it to Apple fans to still try and justify this. They have to solder the battery in and use special screws to take up less space? I wasn't aware that philips head screws take up such a large amount of space compared to a different bit. Apple is truly the pioneer of screws that defy normal physics.

Batteries are pretty frequently replaced in laptops. There is both a decent failure rate and a factor of inevitable weardown of the cells regardless of care and precaution. That is why laptops are traditionally designed with batteries that are not only removeable but EASILY removeable. Any battery failure on these devices means complete replacement. Not like I expect Apple zealots to care, considering they buy the newest product every year anyway and have likely never used the devices long enough to need a new battery.

 

[socalboomer]

[citation][nom]sundragon[/nom]The Wall Street Journal had a great article about this two days ago... http://blogs.wsj.com/cio/2012/07/0 [...] -products/2. Gluing batteries to the case and making ultra thin screens make the Retina Macbook's not meet the EPEAT standards.The desire to cram so much into such a little space made them sacrifice the disassembly of their laptops.[\citation]
funny, according to the article you mentioned, it's because they are no longer easily recyclable without hazard to the recycler. . .

"In order to meet the standards, recyclers need to be able to easily disassemble products, with common tools, to separate toxic components, like batteries." and recyclers can no longer do this easily because they're fused to the case. . .

However, for other companies, who are cramming just as much into just as small a package (or very similarly sized packages) they're still doing it with a mind toward recycling. . .
[citation]3. Apple has a recycling program where they give you money to trade in your old device so they can recycle it: http://www.apple.com/recycling/4. I'd like to see the recycling programs of Lenovo, Toshiba, Asus, etc...[/citation]

True, Apple has a recycling program - but what do they do with the old computers? They go to recyclers who can no longer easily disassemble the components, separating out the hazardous (like the batteries) from the easily recycled (like the case). . .

Lenovo's recycling program - http://www.lenovo.com/social_responsibility/us/en/product_recycling_program.html
Asus' recycling program - http://campuslife.asus.com/index/5284/how-to-recycle-your-asus-pc/

Strangely, all I had to do was to put the company name and "recycling program" into Google and Bing (just to make sure it really WAS that easy) and lo. . . first links were to the company recycling programs. . . Who woulda thought it?

 

[popatim]

You know who is rolling over in his grave right now.

 

[GreaseMonkey_62]

I think it has something to do with Apple's current lawsuit with the earth.

 

[blurr91]

It's interesting that most treehugging liberals love Apple products. Most old-fashioned greedy capitalists love regular ol' PCs. Yet PCs are far more environmentally friendly. Go figure...

 

[sykozis]

[citation][nom]v3rlon[/nom]and the same folks that bash hem for being treehuggers now bash them for not being green enough. EPEAT also said that even MBAs and MBPro Retina qualified for EPEAT, and the older MBPros did anyway. Apple is deciding to withdraw from this standard for whatever reason, but it does not make them more or less Green. And when did special screws stop anyone who really wanted at the hardware?[/citation]
It's the fact that the newer models are non-repairable and non-recyclable that makes them "less green"....and less environmentally friendly.