The big lie of sustainable technology

April 22, 2024 is Earth Day. Originally a day to raise awareness about how plastics are destroying the environment, Earth Day has more recently become a time when all environmental causes are highlighted, because we only have one planet to live on and it makes sense to try to keep it habitable.

Earth Day is also the time of year when tech companies like to remind us of their commitment to making and selling “sustainable” products. However, it seems they don’t understand what this means; sustainable technology is the 21st century version of the light cigarette. It’s still very serious, but not as bad as it could be.

I’m not saying that businesses shouldn’t try to be more environmentally conscious or that every little bit doesn’t help. They should, and they do. I’m talking about the amount of praise companies give themselves for doing the bare minimum and then selling it as something more important than it is. In other words, they are not Really are lying, but they are fundamentally lying.

It’s impossible to build a truly sustainable technology product like a smartphone and sell it for a profit.

You keep using that word…

Sustainable is a strong word that means several different things. If you look the definition, you will see that sustainable means “able to continue at the same level for a period of time”, but you will notice that there is much more to it than that. Sustainability in manufacturing is defined as “using methods that do not harm the environment so that natural resources are still available in the future.”

This may be true for certain parts and assemblies used in technology products like new phones. Copper and aluminum are almost infinitely recyclable, and 100% of the metals used to make phones, tablets and other products could come from scrap materials. The same goes for plastic, even though it is not a true natural resource.

Two other important materials used in the products we love to buy are usually left out: cobalt and lithium. Both are materials used in batteries, and until a better way to store energy is developed, both are needed.

The fact is that both of these materials are also 100% recyclable, and a battery built from completely recycled materials is a reality. However, no tech company is discussing it Apple wants to use recycled cobalt In the coming years.

Until this happens and the new products we buy are made from parts of the old products we sent for recycling, technology products are not sustainable. It doesn’t matter how often or vehemently company executives try to claim otherwise.

Every little bit helps

None of this calls into question companies’ efforts to be more environmentally friendly. Overselling what’s being done and using buzzwords that aren’t true doesn’t mean things aren’t much better than before.

Samsung, Apple, HP, Acer, and almost every other company producing consumer electronics is working to use more recycled materials. Just because we haven’t reached the point where no newly mined metals or newly produced plastics are used in construction doesn’t mean real progress has been made.

The real problem is both simple and complex. It’s also the same issue that drives every other decision made by the companies in question: money. Tech companies are businesses and exist solely to make profits for their shareholders. This is why Google kills products and services that don’t make money. This is why phones no longer have a simple 3.5mm headphone jack. This is also why no company makes a phone made from 100% recycled materials.

Decisions to save money can also help. The real reason your new phone doesn’t come with a charger in the box is because the packaging is smaller. Smaller boxes mean more room on a pallet, which means more room in a truck or shipping container. In addition to saving big on shipping costs, there’s no longer a small piece of electronic waste in every new phone box. Win-win.

However, a company like Apple or Samsung cannot afford to become more like Fairphone. This would eat far too deeply into the bottom line.

No company makes such a product ethically sourced and environmentally friendly like Fairphone, and no company even wants to try.

It’s not difficult to understand why. Fairphone doesn’t make money. The company only made a profit of €44,000 ($47,000) for 2022 and has very little cash in reserve. In contrast, Apple earned $170.782 billion and Samsung earned $31.5 billion. Billion.

If you want to make a phone like the Fairphone 5, you won’t be able to make as many and won’t make as much profit per unit. For Apple and Samsung shareholders, this is not “sustainable,” so the products these companies sell are not as “sustainable.”

Nothing will make the Apples and Samsungs of the world change until they are forced to change. Both companies will continue to source raw materials any way they can and attempt to woo consumers with environmentally friendly measures in areas that don’t hurt the bottom line too much until the world runs out of these materials.

You should do your part by recycling technology products and buying used or refurbished items when you can. You should also know that no matter what they tell you, companies that make consumer technology only care about the environment when it doesn’t hurt their bottom line.