Going green may turn out to be one of the faster growing trends in 2007. The movement of course has been growing for years but it picked up steam last year thanks to programs like the one offered by Pacific Gas and Electric which as a plan to pay as much as 50% of the setup costs — a maximum $4 million per customer — for its customers who opt to use virtualization software to reduce server counts and power and cooling costs in their data centers. Then a European Union directive called RoHS went into effect last summer. RoHS requires that any electrical or electronic equipment sold in the EU after July 1 must be free of lead, cadmium, mercury and other toxins.
There are other programs like Epeat or Electronics Products Environmental Assessment Tool. Funded by the Environmental Protection Agency, Epeat offers a reviewable database of mostly self-rated products for environmental safety. In a recent New York Times article noted that Epeat’s ratings are done largely on the honor system, subject to reviews by the Green Electronics Council, a nonprofit group in Portland, Ore., that maintains the list. Manufacturers score their products against a set of environmental standards, including levels of hazardous substances, energy efficiency and ease of recycling. There are 23 requirements just to win a bronze.
