Greens should not be so certain
30 June 2008
Is there anything as irritating as someone who has enough self-belief to think that they are always right? That is how I felt last week when I saw that Greenpeace was making the news with its updated chart of environmental sinners in the electronics industry
The work that campaign groups do is invaluable, providing a conscience when society, or governments, appear to be losing theirs. Campaign groups also by definition have an agenda that may be in conflict with another campaign group. For example one group may argue that for safety reasons it is imperative that a town has a new road to bypass it, while another group argue that building a bypass would kill trade in the town centre and turn it into a ghost town. Both reasonable arguments if presented in the right way.
Where the irritation comes in is when a group uses incomplete, illogical and ill-informed criteria and information to tell an industry where it is going wrong – this is where Greenpeace’s ‘Greener Electronics Guide’ comes in. I am slightly loathe to say this because I have huge respect for the courage and dedication of much of what Greenpeace does (and am sympathetic to its whole ethos), but if it is willing to criticise all around them with carefree abandon then it should not be above taking some criticism of its own.
I notice that Nintendo came bottom of the list, largely, it claims, on account of not having played Greenpeace’s game and supplied all the information requested. So it becomes a voluntary survey that punishes those who choose not to volunteer, which is not very scientific.
According to Greenpeace’s web site, The Greener Electronics Guide is ‘our way of getting the electronics industry to face up to the problem of e-waste. We want to see an end to the stories of unprotected child labourers scavenging mountains of cast-off gadgets created by society’s gizmo loving ways.’ Also from the site is a quote from Toxics Campaigner Casey Harrell who said: “Electronics giants pay attention to environmental performance on certain issues while ignoring others that are just as important.”
These two quotes sum up what is wrong with this campaign. The issue of e-waste is, like the issue of any other sort of waste, an issue – and one that needs to be resolved, possibly through legislation as it is being done in Europe, but it is a separate issue to that of energy efficiency or carbon footprints. Using emotive arguments about child labourers highlights the tragic side of the problem and the necessity to resolve it, but to put all the blame for this tragedy on the shoulders of the electronics companies, as this list does by implication, is wrong.
Another thrust of the Guide is the chemicals and materials used in electronics. Again a worthy cause but one that needs to be backed by the full scientific facts. In an ideal world we would all agree that if a substance is potentially harmful we should not use it – or should we? The obvious reference here for our industry is the use of lead – bad stuff that is bad for children, apparently. But what if that lead was tied up safely in solder inside our electronic appliances and was then all recycled? In other words, if the WEEE legislation in Europe was properly adhered to then all electronics waste would be recovered. This would then negate the need for the RoHS directive banning lead. It would provide a ready source of lead, meaning less would have to be dug out of the ground. It would mean we would have to use less silver and other expensive materials that go into the lead-free alloys, which are more expensive because they are more difficult to obtain and process. i.e. have greater environmental impact. And it would mean that we could once again reduce the soldering temperatures by 30 degrees and so become more energy efficient in doing so. In other words, the obvious environmental move is not always the best one for the environment.
Here is further thought for you that ties in with the quote above from Casey Harrell about the breadth of environmental accounting. If a mobile phone is made in Northern Europe the factory will require a lot of heating for the majority of the year. If a mobile phone was made in Mexico or Brazil then it would be made in a factory that would require a lot of air conditioning. If it was made in a temperate part of the world, Northern California perhaps or Western Europe, then the energy input required to get the factory to workable temperatures is a lot less. So would the maker of the Californian phone be higher up the Greener Guide than the maker of the Mexican phone? It should be. But then, what if the average employee in the Californian factory drove 30 miles to get to work in a 6.0-litre pick-up truck, while the Mexican worker went to work on the bus with several of his fellow employees? The combined carbon footprint of the employees of the Californian factory has just sent that site’s ratings through the floor. Please excuse the crass stereotypes, I only use them to make the point that taking a few environmental sound bites and presenting them as a scientific survey is misleading and potentially causes damage to businesses that do not (necessarily) deserve it.
So my message to Greenpeace would be to keep up the good work, but to remain effective you need to be credible. To remain credible you need to understand the electronics industry and not just lash out at it.
To balance up this column I have also included the news story about The Greener Electronics Guide in this week’s newsletter. Click here to read it.
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