BSEF blasts Greenpeace’s criticism of the iPhone
Posted by Dennis Sellers 
Oct 22, 2007 at 11:46am
The Bromine Science and Environmental Forum (BSEF), the international organization of the bromine chemical industry is knocking Greenpeace, condemning the environmental lobby group for making unfair criticism of Apple’s iPhone’s green credentials. The firm also claims Greenpeace has sensationalized its findings.
Last week Greenpeace released an analysis of the iPhone, claiming the communications device contains several potentially dangerous chemicals. The tests uncovered two types of hazardous substances, some of which have already been eliminated by other mobile phone makers, the ecology/environment group says.
However, BSEF says that all of the substances reported by Greenpeace are approved for use, and “provide critical performance and safety functions in a wide range of electronic products.” Among the substances reported by Greenpeace are brominated flame retardants (BFRs), which are commonly used in electronics to provide a high level fire safety—in certain applications, they are the most effective products available.
“Preventing fires in electronics is particularly important, as they often contain heat sources and significant amounts of highly flammable plastics,” says the BSEF. “Recent incidents with music players and computer batteries bursting into flames illustrate the dangers. The Greenpeace report does not say which BFRs are present in the iPhone because it does not know. As the report notes, the analytical equipment used for their report can only detect the presence of an element, such as bromine, but not specific chemicals. Therefore, the report speculates about what substances might be present, and raises an alarm without any basis for doing so.”
Even according to the Greenpeace study, the iPhone complies with all EU regulatory requirements.
“The brominated flame retardant most likely used in the iPhone is actually a reactive—i.e. it reacts with other substances to form a plastic and, once reacted, it is also no longer available to the environment,” adds BSEF. “Therefore, the Greenpeace report is incorrect in its assertions about the potential for releases to the environment. Furthermore, as a result of the EU’s WEEE Directive , printed circuit boards such as those used in the iPhone are separated out before being recycled or recovered, in large part because they contain significant amounts of precious metals. Regulations similar to WEEE are being implemented in numerous other places around the world.”
Finally, Greenpeace offers no constructive alternative for providing fire safety in electronic equipment and fails to note that BFRs are among the most tested and well-known flame retardants currently available, the trade organization notes. While alternative substances do exist, none are as well known or as well tested, it adds.
” Flame retardants play a critical role in protecting the public against the very real dangers of fire and the importance of their use in consumer electronics is recognized by responsible electronics manufacturers,” says the BSEF. “Given this critical public safety function, common sense supports using substances that are already compliant with existing regulations, such as REACH and WEEE, rather than using untested or unknown ‘alternatives.’ Reporting its finding, Greenpeace says that it found chemicals that have or are in the process of being eliminated by other mobile phone manufacturers.”
According to Greenpeace, the iPhone contains brominated compounds, indicating the prescence of brominated flame retardants BFRs, and PVCs. A total of 18 individual components and/or materials in the iPhone were tested using XRF (X-Ray Fluorescence spectrometry). XRF analysis can, however, only detect the presence of bromine on the surface of components, rather than specific chemicals in specific concentrations, concludes the BSEF.
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Dennis Sellers
Dennis has been a newspaper editor/reporter (seven years) and teacher (seven years). He has over 10,000 magazine, newspaper and online articles to his credit. He has also covered the Mac and tech industries for over a decade for such online publications as MacCentral, MacMinute and now MacsimumNews.
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