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Just two days after dropping out of the green EPEAT ratings system for electronics manufacturers, Apple has decided it's not so bad after all.
Apple Senior Vice President of Hardware Engineering Bob Mansfield said Friday that the company was reversing its position. This comes after Apple was hit with an eco-backlash over the decision. "We’ve recently heard from many loyal Apple customers who were disappointed to learn that we had removed our products from the EPEAT rating system," Mansfield wrote on Apple's website. "I recognize that this was a mistake. Starting today, all eligible Apple products are back on EPEAT."
The EPEAT (Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool) system measures the greenness of computers, monitors, and laptops. It gives consumers and businesses a shorthand rating -- an easy way to know whether they're buying electronics that are recyclable and built in an environmentally friendly way.
But on Wednesday Apple dropped EPEAT certification for 39 products, saying, essentially, that it felt that its gear was already green enough. "Apple products are superior in other important environmental areas not measured by EPEAT, such as removal of toxic materials," the company said at the time.
Skeptics took this as a sign that Apple was planning to do more of the kind of glued-together and hard-to-recycle design that caused iFixit's Kyle Wiens to brand Apple's new Macbook Pro with Retina display "Unfixable, Unhackable, Untenable."
Dumping EPEAT didn't go over so well with some environmental customers. The City of San Francisco quickly decided stop buying Apple products as a result of the decision, and other organizations that required EPEAT certification started reviewing their upcoming Apple purchases, according to the Wall Street Journal.
That pressure, may have been enough for Apple to reconsider things. The company is sensitive to criticism from environmental groups. Earlier this year, for example,made new commitments to greener energy for its data centers, bowing to pressure from Greenpeace.
But Apple may also have some wiggle room as the EPEAT rating system evolves. "Our relationship with EPEAT has become stronger as a result of this experience," Mansfield wrote, "and we look forward to working with EPEAT as their rating system and the underlying IEEE 1680.1 standard evolve."
"We look forward to Apple’s strong and creative thoughts on ongoing standards development," wrote EPEAT CEO Robert Frisbee in a note posted to the organization's website.
