Green innovations took center stage at this year’s CES, with many big name companies, including Motorola, embracing sustainable design. Motorola’s Renew W233 cellphone features an admirable set of sustainable features that directly address the phone’s carbon footprint and life cycle. By partnering up with Carbonfund.org Motorola offsets the energy to manufacture, distribute, and operate the phone by investing in renewable energy sources and reforestation. Once the phone reaches the end of its life cycle it can be easily recycled by placing it in a prepaid envelope that is provided in the box. Additionally, the phone’s packaging consumes 22% less material and the manual is printed on post consumer recycled paper with soy-based inks.
The phone offers a simple feature set and will be situated in an affordable price bracket, making it available to a wide range of users. It’s great to see large electronics manufacturers making sincere efforts to consider the sustainability of their products, but are they going far enough? I would be interested to know how much of the phone is actually recyclable, and how much will ultimately end up in a landfill.
