At the Apple Distinguished Educator conference this week, Apple Vice President of Environmental Initiatives Lisa Jackson spoke to educators about the importance of the environment and Apple’s related work. Jackson showed the above photo and said “that little green leaf means a lot to me.” The leaf outlines multiple words expressing Apple’s work on the environment such as “Apple Campus 2” and “EPEAT.” During her talk, Jackson shared Apple’s work to trying to reach 100% renewable energy across its operations and she said that Apple is “not going to stop until we get to 101%…”
Since March, the old Mac Pro has not been available to buy in Europe as changes in regulations meant that the old Mac Pro no longer complied with EU law. In particular, the large exposed fans of the Mac Pro were the main reason behind the ban — the amendment required fan guards and minor changes to electrical ports.
With the design of the new Mac Pro, Apple once again complies with regulatory requirements. Via MacGeneration, customers in Europe are now receiving shipment notifications with delivery as early as January 14. According to Apple’s online store, customers ordering today should receive their Mac Pro in February.
Apple today released a new environmental impact report on its Apple and the Environment webpage detailing improvements in the newly launched Mac Pro’s environmental performance. In the report, Apple notes the new Mac Pro meets ENERGY STAR® Version 6.0 standards and gets a Gold rating from EPEAT, but it also provides estimates for the Mac Pro’s lifetime greenhouse gas emissions (around 940 kg CO2e), power consumption, and material efficiency.
In a section outlining the power efficiency of the new Mac Pro with the chart above, Apple claims the new machine “consumes 68 percent less power in idle mode than the previous-generation Mac Pro.” Expand Expanding Close
Jackson with Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus (center), and Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley (right). Photo via Wikipedia.
Per Tim Cook’s announcement at this year’s AllThingsD conference, former EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson will be joining Apple. Jackson, who left the EPA in February of this year, will oversee environmental issues at Apple.
When you get larger, you get more attention. It comes with a territory. I think we’re doing incredible work. Environment for example. [Apple] is the first to eliminate all toxins in products. We ship the most efficient products. We own the largest solar farm of any non-utility firm. Lisa Jackson is joining Apple. She ran the EPA for the last four years. She will run environmental duties.
Jackson, who has a chemical engineering background, will report directly to Tim Cook. Jackson stepped down from EPA Administrator in January when the Obama administration was moving toward supporting the Keystone pipeline which was highly controversial among environmentalists.
Tim Cook announcing that Apple has hired the former head of the EPA is especially notable in light of the company’s back and forth over EPEAT certification earlier last year which ultimately resulted in a letter signed by Bob Mansfield addressing the issue.
Apple was just given the EPEAT Gold certification for the Retina MacBook Pro after reversing its decision to withdraw its products from the green computer registry. Today, iFixit’s Kyle Wien has a few strong words about the MacBook Pro’s Gold certification. He claimed the decision “demonstrates that the EPEAT standard has been watered down to an alarming degree”:
With the Retina MacBook Pro, EPEAT felt there were three specific concerns about the product design that merited further investigation… On the surface, it seems that a product assembled with proprietary screws, glued-in hazardous batteries, non-upgradeable memory and storage, and several large, difficult-to-remove circuit boards would fail all three tests…But it’s not that simple….
Apple’s MacBook Pro with Retina display is not repairable, it’s not upgradeable, and it’s not easy to disassemble for recycling. Yet it is EPEAT Gold. The Product Verification Committee’s decision essentially greenwashes the Retina.
Apple’s products are back on the EPEAT’s registry with a Gold standard, but the Retina MacBook pro notably was at question.
The Cupertino, Calif.-based Company announced earlier this week that it planned to forgo the environmental rating system. The decision allegedly came after the EPEAT took up an issue with the new MacBook Pro’s Retina display and repairability factor, which iFixit detailed in a widely reported analysis last month.
After Apple dropped the EPEAT standard, the city of San Francisco said it planned to stop purchases of some Apple products, and then Politico revealed federal officials were also thinking twice before procuring Apple’s computers.
The hullabaloo apparently caused the folks in Cupertino to second guess their plan of action, as Senior Vice President of Hardware Bob Mansfield suddenly issued a statement on Apple’s environmental page today regarding the contention. He said the company made a mistake and would concede by returning to EPEAT.
Now, a few hours later, the EPEAT’s registry has 40 Apple products listed, including the Retina MacBook Pro. However, its IEEE 1680-2009 Criteria Category Summary (screenshot below) is a bit perplexing, especially considering the reasons reported as to why Apple pulled its products in the first place.