HP took home the Greenpeace’s “Best in Show” award last weekend in Las Vegas. The CES Electronics Show gave the award to HP Compaq 8000f Elite PC for using environmentally friendly parts and design.
Hewlett-Packard’s Compaq 8000f PC is the first of it’s kind to leave out toxic parts such as polyvinyl chloride (PVC) and brominated flame retardants (BFRs). Greenpeace saw HP taking the initiative to create more environmentally friendly laptops and felt they deserved to take home the award this year.
Companies that fail to phase out toxic parts and chemicals get a point deduction in the scoring system. According to Greenpeace, LG, Lenovo, Dell, and Samsung electronics did not make the effort to phase out toxic parts for this 2011 show.
As more and more people become concerned with the environmental impact of electronics, these trends become more important to consumers. In the Guide to Greener Electronics, Apple was actually in last place. The next highest manufacturer was Philips, then Toshiba, then Sony and Nokia in the lead.
Manufacturers are continuing to make improvements as Greenpeace puts the pressure on. Hopefully in the near future, most manufacturers will not use as many toxic chemicals in their PCs.
