In an era where saving natural resources has been the need of the hour, Apple has come up with a bold statement aiming one day to completely avoid mining materials for its products and instead use recycled materials.
In its Environmental Responsibility Report, Apple said – “Materials are mined, manufactured as products, and often end up in landfills after use. Then the process starts over and more materials are extracted from the earth for new products.”
Apple placed its goal for closed-loop supply chain where ‘one day’ the company will only use renewable resources to manufacture its products. However, Apple mentions that the quality of the recycled material is important as the company have some pre-determined quality standards so in the best case scenario, the recycled material is best to extracted from past Apple products. This is why Apple has been encouraging its customers to return their old used Apple products.
Meanwhile, the situation is a little different for ‘tin’. “Unlike aluminum, there is an existing market supply of recycled tin that meets our quality standards.” – the report read. Expectantly, the Cupertino-based giant didn’t disclose the amount of recycle products being put in the process, as of now.
On the other hand, Samsung also recently declared that it might, in fact, sell refurbished Galaxy Note 7 units to avoid wasting resources. However, that never happened which forces us to believe that Samsung might have recycled all of the returned Note 7 units for manufacturing its upcoming products. If you are not aware, Samsung recalled the Galaxy Note 7 last year twice after the device had some serious issues with the battery.The Galaxy Note 7 was never launched in India.
Another important point where smartphone manufacturers should really concentrate is to design products which lasts much longer. This is exactly what an analyst named Cook from Greenpeace has urged OEMs to change in their next production cycle. (Source: ET)