An article in The Register provides a timely reminder that the UK is at last being dragged screaming and shouting into conformance with the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) Directive. The WEEE Directive is an EU initiative to minimise the impact of electrical and electronic equipment on the environment, by increasing re-use and re-cycling and reducing the amount of WEEE going to landfill. (Note: in English, “wee” means “urine” in baby-talk, so the possibilities for bad jokes are endless).

In summary, the WEEE directive means that any workplace (non-household) users have to dispose of WEEE responsibly. The responsibility for handling the disposal lies with the producers of the equipment.

Green organisations have given the WEEE Directive only two cheers. The green mantra is “Reduce – Reuse – Recycle” – in that order. The WEEE Directive ignores the first and most important of these. If you must have a PC, there is only one truly green PC option – keep the one you already have.

There is a long way to go. IT is one of the most profligate industries on the planet. Software vendors pile largely unwanted features (“bloatware”) in order to justify software upgrades, and then force users to upgrade by withdrawing support for old versions. New software invariably requires new hardware. Thanks to Moore’s
Law, hardware manufacturers are able to deliver increasingly powerful equipment at reducing cost, masking the economic impact to users. The impact on the environment is a different matter.

Hardware manufacturers are also not without blame. Jumping on the green bandwagon, the market is full of new ranges of low power consumption ‘green’ PCs. If you haven’t got a PC, can’t find a recycled one, and really need one, then they are an advantage. But how many users will be tempted to boost their green credentials by throwing out perfectly good PCs and replacing them with ‘green’ ones? Oh, and have you ever tried buying upgrades for PCs over a year old – isn’t it amazing how expensive they are?

If IT was really serious about reducing its impact on the planet, it could do much much more to produce energy efficient software and longer life hardware. A few random ideas:

• Workplaces should make much greater use of shared computing (like the LTSP thin client solution)
• Hardware and software should be graded for energy efficiency
• When a vendor withdraws routine support for a software package, it should be obliged to open source the code so no-one is forced to upgrade
• Hardware manufacturers should be obliged to guarantee spare parts at original cost for five years from the time of sale

Any more?

This entry was posted on Friday, June 29th, 2007 at 7:22 pm and is filed under Greenery. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.