Apple has rejoined the Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool registry just days after withdrawing its 39 desktop computers, monitors and laptops – and its MacBook Pro with Retina Display, widely rumored to have been the reason for the company’s departure, has been listed as Gold-certified in the registry.
Apple’s decision to remove its products from EPEAT’s sustainability rating system was a mistake, Bob Mansfield, the company’s senior vice president of hardware engineering, said in a letter posted on the company’s website.
On Friday, all eligible Apple products were placed back on EPEAT, a move that will allow governments and universities basing their purchasing decisions on the rating system to continue to buy computers, monitors and laptops from the Cupertino, Calf.-based company. San Francisco’s city government had said last week that it would no longer be able to buy these products.
The company went a step further and gave Gold labels to the four models of its MacBook Pro with Retina display, the same device that teardown site iFixit said last month had a battery glued to the case and was the least repairable they’d ever taken apart. Online sources had speculated that this tough disassembly was behind Apple’s withdrawal from the standard – since under EPEAT, manufacturers must show that recyclers can easily disassemble their products and separate batteries and other toxic components.
Source: Environmental Leader