Dial G for Green

Ranking high on Greenpeace’s Guide to Greener Electronics is Nokia with its take-back program for used phones as well as providing information to users on what to do with their discarded devices. According to Ambrish Bakaya,Director Corporate Affairs,Nokia India,“The take-back and recycling campaign in India as well as across 85 countries is aimed at driving behavioral changes amongst consumers to make recycling of old and discarded handsets an instinctive action.” As part of this campaign,Nokia encourages consumers to drop their unused mobiles and chargers,irrespective of the brand into recycling bins placed at any of its Nokia Care Centres or Priority Dealers in these cities. There are more than 1300 such recycling bins spread out across the length and breadth of India. “Nokia has also launched a unique SMS campaign wherein customers can get to know about the nearest Nokia mobile waste collection point by simply sending an SMS ‘Green’ to 55555 from their handsets – anywhere,anytime. The first phase of the campaign collected over 3 tonnes of mobile waste including 10,000 handsets in the first 45 days. Additionally,Nokia has committed to planting a sapling for each handset collected in these recycling bins,” adds Bakaya. More than 10,000 saplings have already been planted across Chennai and Bangalore. “We believe that if each mobile phone user recycled just one unused phone,together we would save nearly 240,000 tonnes of raw materials and if every Nokia user recycled just one unused phone at the end of its life,together we would save nearly 80,000 tonnes of raw materials,” says Bakaya.

While India without well-rounded guidelines still faces questions relating to energy consumption,sustainability,recycling,take-back programmes,toxic material management,end of life programme,energy efficiency,reduction in packaging,world over,governments and companies are earning green points.

Back to the Greenpeace’s Guide to Greener Electronics,Samsung stands second while Sony Ericsson scored third for its toxic chemical management. LG’s dived from 4th to 11th place after delaying its commitment to remove PVCs and BFRs from all its products. While this gives an estimate scale of how green a company is,there is still no standard involving environmental and carbon footprint issues.

Look West,and Motorola’s out with the W233 Renew made of recycled water bottles – world’s first carbon-neutral phone. Not only has the size of packaging been reduced,the in-box materials are printed using vegetable-based inks on recycled paper and a postage-paid envelope is thrown in so the user can return his previous handset for recycling. Samsung’s unveiled handsets with solar panels which,when exposed to sunlight for 10 minutes,will generate enough power for a three-minute call. The Samsung Blue Earth on the other hand,takes about 15 hours to fully charge utilizing only the solar panel on the rear of the device. Chinese manufacturer ZTE,too,launched a model of its own called the Coral-200-Solar.

Sony Ericsson too announced two eco-friendly phones – the C901 GreenHeart and Naite. Nokia’s eco prototypes are 3110 Evolve (2007) and Remade (2008). “We have worked continuously to reduce our own CO2 emissions by 20 per cent and product life cycle CO2 emissions by 15 per cent by 2015,” says Mats Pellbäck Scharp,Environmental Director at Sony Ericsson. Sony Ericsson’s Elm phone and the Bluetooth Noise Shield Handsfree VH700 are the newest additions to the company’s GreenHeart portfolio. This mobile phone and accessory provide consumers with an expanded range of products to make an educated green choice without compromising on design and functionality. With green being the mantra,Sony Ericsson’s all set to make all accessories greenheart compliant by 2011. “Changes like an E manual in the phone,minimized packaging,waterborne paint,the use of recycled plastics,and low power consumption chargers make the phone truly a ‘Smartphone’. The phone also comes loaded with the Walkmate application which tracks your daily exercise to keep yourself and your environment fit,” informs Peter Ang,Vice President of Marketing of Asia Pacific at Sony Ericsson. So,care to have a green heart?