The iPhone 5 is a huge hit, no matter what people say it is the largest selling smart phone in the market. Its environmentally friendly as well; HealthyStuff.org and iFixit completed a chemical analysis of 36 smartphone including previous generations of the device as well.
This chemical rating has a scale from 0 to 5, 0 being the lowest and 5 being the highest. A figure around 0 to 3.5 means it’s environmentally friendly.
The iPhone had a score of 2.8 and you will be surprised to know that the iPhone 2G was at the far end of the scale at a score of 5!
More surprisingly the iPhone 4S had a better score than the iPhone 5 which means Apple could not reduce the amount of hazardous chemicals in the device.
The iPhone 4S had a score of 2.7 and the iPhone 4 was at 2.95. The Motorola Citrus was by far the most environmentally friendly phone being rated at 2.56.
However the iPhones competitors like the Samsung Galaxy SIII and HTC all fall short as they have a score greater than 3.
iFixit also reports that every year only 8% of the 130 million discarded cell phones are recycled at proper recycling facilities.
Since Apple is going to make more than 100 million iPhones every year their commitment at making the “most environmentally responsible products in our industry†is a very important one.
This is what iFixit says when asked about how they rank phones:
“So, to learn more about chemicals in phones on the market today, HealthyStuff.org researchers took apart 36 phones and submitted their components to X-ray fluorescence spectrometry—a process that determines the chemical composition of a material.
The researchers then rated and ranked the phones on a scale of 0 – 5, lowest being best, in three ways: by chemical (for each of 12 commonly found hazardous chemicals, such as bromine, mercury, and lead), by component (case, screen, solder, circuit board, etc.), and overall.â€
Do you give your cell phones at recycling facilities?
low concern’ in chemical analysis of 36 smartphones.
[Via]
