greentechZONE Products for the week of June 25, 2007
Dell Computers Says....
Latitude D630 Notebook Offers High Performance and EPEAT Gold Environmental Compliance
Company also makes gold-status desktop products available
Dell's Latitude D630 is the first globally available notebook computer to achieve gold status with the Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool (EPEAT), a procurement system that helps purchasers in the public and private sectors evaluate, compare and select products based on environmental attributes.
The company also announced today that its OptiPlex 740 and 745 Energy Smart mini-tower systems, two of the company's most-demanded commercial desktop products, are EPEAT Gold listed. Dell already has shipped nearly 4 million OptiPlex 745 family systems, in contrast to a limited offering from a competitor.
"Dell is distinct in our industry in that we are integrating environmental standards into mainstream, high-volume global products. This enables our customers to achieve their own goals around performance, cost and environmental stewardship," said David Lear, director of environmental affairs for Dell. "These products represent industry leadership and reflect our commitment to provide the best customer experience and help protect the environment we all share."
"We congratulate Dell on a remarkable accomplishment," said Jeff Omelchuck, executive director of the Green Electronics Council, which manages the EPEAT program. "These are among the most environmentally preferable computer products ever released."
EPEAT helps purchasers evaluate, compare and select products based on criteria under the following categories:
- Reduction/elimination of environmentally sensitive materials
- Materials selection
- Design for end of life
- Product longevity/life cycle extension
- Energy conservation
- End of life management
- Corporate performance
- Packaging
Products meeting or exceeding each of the 23 required criteria are recognized as EPEAT Bronze. Products meeting all required criteria and at least 50 percent of the tool's optional criteria are recognized as EPEAT Silver. Products meeting all required criteria and at least 75 percent of the optional criteria are recognized as EPEAT Gold.
In addition to meeting Energy Star 4.0 requirements and providing 25 percent post-consumer recycled content in cardboard packaging, Dell offers large institutional customers who purchase the Latitude D630, OptiPlex 740 and 745 Energy Smart mini-tower systems the option of a returnable and reusable packaging program.
Dell helped lead the multi-stakeholder development of EPEAT and currently serves on its board of advisers. The company lists more than 60 computers, notebooks and monitors within the tool to help purchasers from the public and private sectors make environmentally responsible IT decisions. Federal agencies are required by executive order to ensure that at least 95 percent of the computer products they purchase are EPEAT-qualified.
Dell incorporates strict environmental standards into every aspect of its global business. Earlier this week, the company announced a long-term global effort to partner with customers, employees and suppliers to become the greenest technology company on the planet. The company also expanded its "Plant a Tree for Me" program to Europe and committed to reduce the carbon intensity of its global operations by 15 percent by 2012.
EN-Genius Says...
It looks like any other slim beige-box laptop computer, but the generic appearance belies the green revolution that lurks behind the keyboard of the Dell Latitude D630. Bristling with a dual-core processor, a shock-protected SATA drive, high-speed WLAN, and all the techno-bling you'd expect in a business-class laptop, the D360 also boasts lower energy consumption, easier upgradeability, and a much smaller environmental footprint than anything else on the market to date. This is the third fruit of Dell's efforts to design some of its most popular products to meet the stringent EPEAT Gold eco-label requirements, a process which seems to have driven the company to re-think many aspects of how it makes and sells its computers. It's also proof for the rest of the industry that it's possible (and profitable) to apply stringent design-for-environment (DfE) practices to high-volume, low-margin consumer goods.
 Achieving EPEAT Gold certification is as much a business necessity as an environmental imperative, according to Mark Schaffer, Dell's Environmental Affairs Manager, because this new standard is being used increasingly as a selection tool for environmentally-conscious purchasers like the Federal Government, and many State and Municipal agencies. Schaffer says that EPEAT compliance is also starting to be a requirement in the purchase orders of many forward-thinking corporations. EPEAT is also being used as the basis for eco-labeling regulations in other countries, including Canada and China.
Since the D630 and its comparable desktop products are a great example of pragmatic, cost-effective eco-design, I thought it would be worthwhile taking a closer look at some of the features that enabled them to achieve such excellent technical and environmental performance.
Earth-friendliness aside, the D630 is no slouch when it comes to processor crunch or features. Its tough magnesium alloy sub-frame and shock protection for the hard drive are both musts for a knock-about traveler like me. Even in its most basic configuration, you get a lovely 14.1 inch WXGA (upgradeable to WXGA+) screen, a 1.8 GHz Intel Duo 2-core processor (800 MHz FSB), a Gig of RAM, 802.11g Wi-Fi, an 8x DRD R/W, and a 60-Gbyte SATA hard drive for a bit over $1300. Add a faster processor (up to 2.4 GHz), more memory, a big, fast disk, a high-end Nvidia Quadro video card and a docking station and the price ends up in the neighborhood of $1800 - $2000. You can price out your own configuration on Dell's web site.
Making products that both appeal to users and qualify for EPEAT Gold status required Dell to take a full-lifecycle approach to their designs, a process which affected both how they designed and manufactured their products. And, as we'll see, it also affected how the company deals with its products once they are in customer's hands.
Perhaps the most straightforward part of their eco-design program was putting their products on an energy diet. The D630 (like many other recent Dell products) meets the stringent EnergyStar 4.0 requirements of less than 20 W in idle, under 2.4 W in sleep mode, and under a watt when turned off. This was accomplished through use of a switched supply that delivers 87+% efficiency (EnergyStar requires 84%) plus a combination of good board design and careful work with the energy-saving modes in Microsoft Windows. Besides reducing its carbon footprint, users get to enjoy a cooler-running (i.e. longer-lived) computer and longer battery life.
Since a 5-lb laptop creates somewhere between 5000 and 20,000 lbs of waste during its manufacture, one of the best ways to minimize its environmental impact is to keep it in service for six years or more instead of the current three-to-four year average. That's why the EPEAT criteria includes points for modular design that makes both repairs and upgrades easy. Dell seems to have done a great job in making sure the D630 can be serviced and that all major components can be quickly swapped out. As a result, the D630 and other new computers cost less to repair or recycle.
Besides cutting repair times, its modular construction enables upgrades of disk drives, peripherals, memory, video cards, and even processors that can add years to its useful life. Dell also complies with EPEAT requirement to stock all essential spare/repair parts for five years after the end of production so you won't be stuck with an orphaned machine that can't be repaired.
Meeting EPEAT recyclability requirements was another interesting challenge. This part of the standard is aimed at making sure products can be easily disassembled into parts which can then be recovered instead of ending up in a landfill. To this end, Dell's new designs reflect a number of relatively simple guidelines:
- Use mechanical designs that simplify service and disassembly procedures. Dell modular design practices helped create computers that require few, if any tools to take them apart and, wherever possible, provide visual clues on how to do it
- Minimize the number of different types of plastics used in order to simplify sorting and materials recovery after disassembly
- Eliminate bromine-based compounds in all large plastic parts (greater than 25 g). (Originally added to plastics as a cheap fire retardant, bromine makes them very difficult to recycle)
- All plastic parts are marked (per ISO 11469) with a symbol that identifies the type of material to ensure quick, easy sorting for cost-effective recycling
EPEAT standards also include making sure that a company's products actually get properly recycled at the far end of the supply chain, so Dell has developed an extensive take-back program that offers free consumer recycling worldwide. Any Dell owner wanting to return a computer can download and print a free pre-paid shipping label from the company web site, paste it on the box, and drop it off. You can even recycle another brand of computer when purchasing a Dell.
To achieve full compliance with EPEAT recycling requirements, Dell also performs active audits of all the recyclers contracted to handle their products. This includes accounting for parts and materials flows as they move from collection points all the way down to what is referred to as 3rd-tier recyclers to ensure that little goes to waste and nothing is disposed of in an unsafe manner. Dell claims that its audit system ensures that close to 100% of materials & components are accounted for.
The Latitude D630 and OptiPlex 740 and 745 Energy Smart mini-tower systems are available immediately.
As a point of reference, the EPEAT specification is defined by the IEEE 1680:2006 eco-performance standard which defines requirements for everything from energy efficiency and hazardous materials content to recyclability criteria. You can either purchase the full specification from the IEEE or download a nice overview for free at the Green Electronics Council's web site.
Yup, that's right -- up to 20,000 pounds of crud left behind, according to Eric Williams' book Computers and the Environment. This figure is derived from a nifty analysis that Williams includes which tallies up all the mine tailings from the various materials used, the energy, process chemicals and water required to produce the chips, and all the rest of the waste byproducts that result from manufacturing a computer.
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