Chicago (IL) – Green comes in many different shades. And we know that companies exploit their green initiatives for marketing purposes in every way they can these days. Apple has not been known for being especially green so far and seems to be trailing the trend overall. That became somewhat apparent when we wrote about green power purchases yesterday and learned how the company ranks earlier today. We also have an update why Dell buys much more green power than it actually needs.
So we learned that Intel buys enough green power that would provide juice for 130,000 average U.S. homes and there are plenty of U.S. companies that purchase all of their electricity needs from alternative power generators such as wind farms. Interestingly, we received lots of inquiries where Apple ranks in this list, as it was not among the 50 largest organization purchasing green power these days. A valid question. We went back to the EPA and asked: Where is Apple?
Blaine Collision, director of the EPA’s green power partnership, told TG Daily that it does not provide details on rankings beyond the top 50, but said that Apple is currently only purchasing green power for its Austin, Texas, facilities. The amount was 9,843,000 kWh, which is, for example, only 13% of what AMD purchases and only 0.8% of the green power Intel buys. Blaine could not say why Apple does not buy more green power, but mentioned that the green power project was fairly new and organizations tend to run a pilot project and then expand it over time.
At least at this time, we would consider Apple’s effort in this discipline as light green. So don’t get too excited about Apple’s effort to offer some environmentally products just yet.
And speaking of that, it seems that even when it comes to the product itself, there are some companies that are way ahead of the game of others. For example, some companies purchase much more green power than they actually need, in an effort to reduce their overall carbon footprint. Collision told us that’s companies actually measure the impact of their product until it reaches the consumer, including transportation of it to retail stores. The extra power purchases go towards funding projects with “free” green power and could even expand to provide employees with green power that has been paid for by the employer. For example, Dell purchases 58% more power than it actually consumes.
Truly amazing initiatives and ideas that are worth being highlighted.
