"Design for environment"
If the heavy metals in computers make for rather intractable challenges, PC makers have found greater success in making it easier to upgrade aging but still functional machines and to take apart obsolete ones. It's an approach the industry refers to as "design for environment."
The EIA, for example, points to Apple's use of an access door and modular design in its Power Mac line to allow easy installation, upgrading and servicing of expansion cards, memory and storage devices. In that same vein, IBM says it has reduced the variety of screws, bolts, plastics and glues in its products, changes that make it easier for recyclers to disassemble and process old computers.
But other design impulses may get in the way. "The problem is the whole faster, cheaper, smaller push," said Gary Davis of the Centre for Clean Products and Clean Technologies at the University of Tennessee. "When things get cheaper, they tend to lose their value for recycling and reuse."
Indeed, the demand for recycled products remains modest at best.
The European Union, which has put a great deal of pressure on electronics makers to take responsibility for obsolete products, acknowledges that producers have "hardly any economic incentive" to factor waste management into the design stage. But it believes its doctrine of extended producer responsibility and mandates for product take-back and recycling will provide that incentive.
The EU's parliamentary arm also is examining a proposal to improve waste management at the product design and manufacture stage. That sort of effort is particularly offensive to an industry that prides itself on its voluntary achievements and independence.
"It's inevitable that design will play a role," said Holly Evans of the Electronic Industries Alliance. "But industry is opposed to government suddenly telling them how to design their products, so that's sort of a touchy area."
Given such vastly different political perspectives, on top of already-complicated engineering issues, many believe that some form of pollution is probably inevitable if computing technology continues to play an important role in society.
The Green Design Initiative at Carnegie Mellon University is apparently bracing for that reality in this posting on its Web site: "Generally speaking, it will be impossible to remove all toxics from the design of computers."
