It’s not easy being green

The wireless industry must continue its leadership role in addressing consumer-electronics waste, not just because it’s good corporate citizenship, but because it’s good business – for individual companies and the planet.
Indeed, the world’s most popular device, the cellphone, is merely the face of an entire ecosystem behind it that enables it to work. Powering 3 billion wireless users requires enormous amounts of electricity, oil, plastics, battery power, steel, concrete, etc. The potential impact this industry has on the globe cannot be understated. In the United States alone, more than 100 million handsets are dumped annually, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.
But real progress is being made. The running theme our editorial staff found in reporting this special report: wireless companies are implementing environmentally friendly initiatives because it saves them money. It’s about reducing operating expenses and capital expenses. Multinational companies are complying with the strictest environmental rules like those found in the European Union due to economies of scale; this benefits countries like the United States, which have less-stringent standards.
And wireless companies are using regulatory compliance initiatives to force their competitors to step up to the plate. (This is probably done to make their competitors dole out some operating expenses of their own rather than out of any sense of good will toward Mother Earth, but the result is the same, nevertheless.)
The wireless industry will make a real difference in helping the world become a little less toxic in the services it can provide to help other businesses and consumers more eco-friendly. In publishing, for example, the cost of newspaper and ink is high; but people more and more are turning to wireless technology to find information. (And yes, I fully get the irony of producing a green issue in print. Publishing also needs to work to improve its earth-friendly efforts.) Machine-to-machine communications can manage power plants and large campuses remotely; GPS services can help people get where they’re going more efficiently. The potential applications are limitless – good news in a world where we’re finding out some resources are limited.