Along with Apple quadrupling its recycling program, the company today shared its 2019 Environmental Responsibility Report which details the progress its has made over the last year. Among its results include a 35% reduction in carbon footprint over the last three years, progress towards its goal of a mining-free future, and more.
Apple has announced that it is quadrupling its US iPhone recycling program by making it available through Best Buy stores throughout the country. The program will also be available through KPN stores in the Netherlands. Phones will be returned to Apple for recycling by its Daisy robots.
The company is celebrating the development on its homepage, with the top section devoted to its trade-in program and environmental credentials …
Apple crossed the 100% renewable energy goal for its own operations (headquarters, data centers, retail stores) this time last year. However, the company is also convincing supply chain partners to go green too.
Today, Apple announced that it has doubled the number of suppliers who have agreed to run Apple manufacturing on 100% renewable energy too. The supply chain will add 5 gigawatts of renewable energy by 2020, exceeding Apple’s original 4 gigawatt goal.
Apple first promised a mining-free future back in 2017, saying it planned to eventually create all its devices from 100% recycled materials.
The company said at the time that it didn’t yet know how to achieve this, and experts today point to some of the challenges the company will face along the way to this grand vision …
A new report today from Motherboard takes a look at the quickly escalating problem of electronics waste. It has now become the fastest-growing stream of waste in the world, with discarded devices’ raw materials currently being valued at $62.5 billion. While Apple has admirable goals like finding a way to stop mining the earth, does it have a responsibility to take more action now?
Announced at the World Economic Forum in Davos, the World Business Council for Sustainable Development has some ideas on accelerating progress.
An Apple report on the business impact of climate change shows how extreme weather conditions could have benefits for the company as well as downsides.
The report was published by the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP), a non-profit which aims to encourage companies to make the right choices about their environmental impact. Its reports collate company responses to questions about their policies, targets and performance – but the most interesting section is on the ‘risks and opportunities’ …
Back in July, Lyft offered to give $550 in credit to Chicago residents who proved they could live without their car for a month, substituting a mixture of Lyft, Zipcar, bike shares and public transit. It’s now offering a similar deal to residents in 35 other US cities …
Apple is highlighting some of the iPhone’s key differentiators with a new webpage and several fun animations posted on YouTube. The page is currently live on Apple’s German website, and will likely roll out to other countries soon.
The Environmental Law Institute has today announced that Apple’s VP of environment, policy and social initiatives, Lisa Jackson, has won its distinguished 2018 Environmental Achievement Award.
Aluminum is Apple’s go-to material for making many of its products sleek and durable, and now the company is taking serious steps to ensure using its favorite metal is also good for the planet.
Two major aluminum producers are announcing a “joint venture to commercialize patented technology that eliminates direct greenhouse gas emissions from the traditional smelting process,” and Apple played a key role in getting to this step.
Apple prides itself on being environmentally focused and is continuously working to reduce its environmental footprint. According to Apple’s 2018 Environment Responsibility Report released today, the company is focusing on climate change, resources, and safer materials.
In celebration of Earth Day this coming Sunday, Apple will be hosting two special Today at Apple sessions at their Union Square store in downtown San Francisco.
Apple yesterday announced a really impressive achievement: its entire global operations are now 100% powered by renewable energy. That encompasses everything from retail stores and local offices through data centers to its Apple Park campus.
Unlike many companies, Apple doesn’t cheat by buying offsets.
“You could go out and buy carbon credits and offsets–nope,” says Jackson firmly. “You could go out and wait for other people to do projects and say ‘Can I have some of that please? How much will you charge me for some of your clean energy?’ No.”
Last time it updated us, the figure was 96%. When you don’t cheat, getting there with that last few percent is a far bigger achievement than it might sound, and I think Apple deserves every credit for this …
[Update: Apple has shared a press release on its environmental progress and hitting 100% renewable energy.]
Apple has finally hit its goal of running its own operations off 100% renewable energy. All Apple facilities, from Apple Park to its data centers to worldwide fleet of Apple retail stores, are now solely powered by green energy. Last year, it was close at 96%, but now it’s finally hit the magic 100 number.
This figure does not include Apple’s third-party suppliers or manufacturers, although the company is convincing many of those to switch to 100% renewable sources too …
Apple is speaking out against the Environmental Protection Agency’s plan to repeal efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, Reuters reports. In a new filing, Apple cites “increased investment uncertainty” for the company and its supplier partners if the Clean Power Plan is reversed.
Last month, Apple shared an environmental report specific to the iPhone X. One detail in the report is that “100 percent of packaging fibers are sourced from responsibly managed forests, bamboo, waste sugarcane, or recycled paper.” Now, Apple has released a white paper thoroughly detailing its “Paper and Packaging Strategy”.
Apple is proud of its environmental credentials, and publishes an annual Environmental Responsibility Report to describe its goals and the actions taken to achieve them. But the company has now gone further, and published a specific environmental report on the upcoming iPhone X.
The four-page report details everything from the breakdown of materials used to produce both the phone and its packaging, through to the greenhouse gas emissions involved in every stage from production to eventual recycling …
Apple shared a series of lighthearted animated videos for Earth Day back in April and today the company has released another new video in the same style. This one highlights the company’s efforts with sustainable packaging…
A Greenpeace campaign to highlight the environmental impact of planned obsolescence has slated iPads and MacBooks for their poor repairability scores, but praises the iPhone 7.
It follows a separate report earlier this year in which Greenpeace labelled Apple the most environmentally friendly tech company in the world …
In celebration of Earth Day, Apple executive Lisa Jackson this week sat down with John Gruber for an in-depth interview. Airing as part of Gruber’s “The Talk Show” podcast, the interview discussed a variety of environmental topics, especially relating to Apple’s own efforts…
Apple’s commitment to environmental sustainability is well established, but the company is going one step further in its new Danish data center. In addition to powering the center entirely from renewable energy, the company is capturing the waste heat generated and feeding it into a district heating system, to warm local homes …
Just like Apple itself is doing, many app developers are celebrating Earth Day with new apps and promotions. After Ice is a new app that uses augmented reality to simulate the effects of climate change around the world…
Apple has published a new series of videos in celebration of Earth Day that both highlight the company’s green energy efforts and explain some of the science behind clean energy today. The video series includes comical illustrations and narrations from Apple execs including VP Lisa Jackson.
There’s an acronym widely used for setting goals: SMART. There are a few different versions of this floating around, but one common one is that objectives should be Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time-bound. Apple’s stated commitment to stop mining the earth and build all products from recycled materials would seem to fail on two of these criteria.
It isn’t currently achievable. It simply isn’t realistic today for Apple to obtain all of the materials it requires in the quantities it needs at a viable price without mining some of them, and there’s no saying when it might become so.
It’s also not time-bound. Apple has given no indication of when it might reach its goal. Anyone can claim almost anything will be achieved – however far-fetched – without specifying a timeframe.
But while Apple’s objective isn’t SMART, that doesn’t make it either meaningless or useless …
