The Obama Administration recently issued Executive Order 13693, which outlines federal guidelines for using sustainable building materials, alternative energy sources, eco-friendly cars and purchasing decisions, among others. The executive order promotes the purchase of ENERGY STAR-qualified products, “recycled content products designated by EPA” and products designated as “BioPreferred and biobased” by the US Department of Agriculture. It also recommends reducing copier and printing paper use, and acquiring uncoated printing and writing paper containing at least 30 percent postconsumer recycled content or higher. However, it fails to mention the Green Electronics Council’s EPEAT (Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool) environmental purchasing guidelines.
Previous executive orders have used EPEAT as a means to guide purchasers toward more eco-friendly products. Whether it’s to reduce energy costs, improve public relations or actively work toward a more sustainable future, many organizations in both the federal and private sectors use these guidelines to write their RFPs (request for proposal). This latest omission of EPEAT from the executive order potentially leaves out some key provisions that not only help to reduce energy use and manage the hazards of a product’s afterlife, but also work to promote the production of environmentally friendly electronic products.
Nowhere in the executive order does it mention why EPEAT language was omitted. Even the folks at the Green Electronics Council were puzzled. Executive Order 13693 mentions several older executive orders that have now been revoked. Under one such revocation, Executive Order 13693 says, “Pursuant to section 742(b) of Public Law 111-117, I have determined that this order will achieve equal or better environmental or energy efficiency results than Executive Order 13423. Therefore, Executive Order 13423 of January 24, 2007, is revoked.” Executive Order 13423 provided a lot of the same guidelines, including one for electronics management that stated, “Annually, 95 percent of electronic products purchased must meet Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool standards where applicable; enable Energy Star features on 100 percent of computers and monitors; and reuse, donate, sell, or recycle 100 percent of electronic products using environmentally sound management practices.” Given that this latest executive order does not go into such specifics regarding electronic products, it is hard to determine how it can be perceived as achieving “equal or better environmental or energy efficiency results.” A message left with the US Environmental Protection Agency regarding this concern was not immediately answered.
However, the Green Electronics Council says many of its eco-conscious purchasers have asked the Obama Administration to continue to reference EPEAT in the executive order. The Green Electronics Council noted that EPEAT appears in scores of long-term federal contracts, so in the short term its removal may not significantly change the U.S. government’s “procurement outlook.” And there’s nothing specifically preventing government offices from continuing to follow EPEAT. “We are heartened at the support both from purchasers around the world who rely on EPEAT to inform their electronics procurement and from stakeholders who helped create EPEAT’s underlying environmental leadership standards,” said a Green Electronics Council spokesperson. “While we hope the Administration will be responsive to the concerns of purchasers, including federal purchasers who have relied on EPEAT for years, we don’t know who has contacted the Administration, nor whether the Administration will respond.”
EPEAT, which was previously a set of guidelines for environmentally friendly computer purchases, expanded its scope in 2013 to include document imaging devices. The Green Electronics Council worked for four years with document imaging industry experts to establish environmental guidelines to help curb energy use, reduce the use of environmentally sensitive materials, improve indoor air quality and promote the use of recycled materials. EPEAT guidelines for printers/copiers also included metrics on product end-of-life management and design, product life cycle expansion, packaging, consumables and corporate performance. (For more information, check out BLI’s April 2013 article, EPEAT Environmental Guidelines Enter the Mainstream.) In the two years since the EPEAT guidelines for imaging devices were finalized, well over 1,000 products have earned EPEAT certification. The organization says EPEAT stakeholders are also actively working on new standards for servers and mobile phones, both of which should be finalized in the next year and implemented in the EPEAT system thereafter. “We are very optimistic about the value EPEAT provides to the sustainable purchasing community, to the global electronics sector, and to the overall environment by driving cleaner, more sustainable solutions,” said a Green Electronics Council spokesperson.
