On the heels of Apple’s environmental-focused iPhone 15 event, Apple CEO Tim Cook has sat down with Brut. Magazine to talk more about the company’s ambitions.
The Apple CEO touched on why Apple feels the need to release a new iPhone every year, what the iPhone might look like in 20-30 years, and what he does in his personal life to be environmentally conscious.
In the interview, which was posted as a 5-minute video on the Brut. website, Tim Cook opened by explaining why Apple makes a new iPhone every year. After all, wouldn’t the most environmentally-friendly approach be to reduce the rate of iPhone upgrades? Here’s Cook’s response:
Question: Do you think we really need a new iPhone every year?
Cook: I think having an iPhone every year for those people that want it is a great thing. And what we do is we allow people to trade in their phone. And so we then resell that phone if it’s still working. And if it’s not working, we’ve got ways of disassembling it and taking the materials to make a new iPhone out of.
When it comes to what an iPhone might look like in 20-30 years, Cook was unsurprisingly cagey, instead focusing on the fact that an iPhone on that timeline would be carbon neutral:
Question: What would an iPhone look like in 20 or 30 years? Do you think innovation and technology can save the planet?
Cook: I think it’ll be carbon neutral. I think obviously it will be way ahead of where it currently is, but I wouldn’t want to give you all of our secrets in that regard. I’ll just say from an environmental point of view, it’ll be carbon neutral.
Following Apple’s iPhone 15 event last month, there were some questions about whether Apple’s environmental announcements were greenwashing. In this week’s interview, Cook pushes back on that.
Question: When we post videos about Apple products on Brute, the comments from our community often touch on greenwashing, the use of rare metals and calls for more restraint, consuming less. What is your response to them?
Cook: Well, greenwashing is reprehensible. And so what if you think about what we’re doing, we’re doing the work and then saying what we’re doing and you’re standing in part of the work today. So there’s a real proof point. The fact that there’s 30% recycled material on the watch, that’s a proof point.
The fact that we took air transportation down dramatically to sea transportation on the transportation footprint. This is an action. The fact that we’re shrinking packaging so more of these things will fit on one pallet. This is a key action. We’re eliminating plastics. All of these things are actions that we’ve taken and they all add up to now a carbon-neutral watch. and by 2030, carbon neutral products across the board
Cook also revealed some of the things he does on a personal level to lower his carbon footprint:
Question: And on a personal level, what are your ecological efforts?
Cook: I do drive an electric car. I try to avoid plastics and plastic bottles. I recycle. I compost. All of these things I try to do, everything I do, I try my best to do something that has a lower carbon footprint.
I’d love to know what electric car Tim Cook is whipping around Cupertino and Palo Alto. As far as I know, he’s never revealed his preferences and has never been photographed with an EV. In fact, I think the only time Cook has been pictured driving his personal car was in 2014, when it was a BMW 5-series of some sort.
What EV do you think Tim Cook drives? Is it a Tesla? A Chevy Bolt? A Porsche Taycan? A Lucid Air? He seems to have a preference for sedans, but he was seen taking a Rivian for a test drive last year at the Sun Valley conference. Let us know your guesses down in the comments…
You can watch the full interview on the Brut. website.
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