HP Sticks Eco Labels On Printers

May 22, 2008

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HP has launched a new program, Eco Solutions, designed to provide costumers with environmental information about HP products.

The program includes the HP Eco Highlights label which will be used across all HP product categories, with the newly introduced HP Deskjet D2545, HP LaserJet P4015x, LaserJet P4515x and LaserJet P4515xm printers being the first products to feature it. The labels will be featured on packaging, the web and in data sheets.

The labels offer information about potential energy and resource savings, rather than offering info on carbon emitted during manufacture and the trip through the supply chain, as is associated with the carbon labels being tested by various companies. Some of the info on HP’s label, such as “advanced toner technology enables more energy efficient printing,” sounds more like marketing hype than useful information.

HP seems enthralled with the idea of putting its green credentials on its packaging. Earlier this month, HP announced that it was the first company to receive approval from the U.S. EPA to have the agency’s SmartWay logo displayed on a selection of its consumer product packaging.

HP might be pumping up its green marketing on packages in order to tap into the growing pool of green consumers – a report from last December found that of major computer manufacturers, HP’s customers are the least green.

The company does have green achievements it can boast about. HP’s entire personal workstation line was the first in the category to achieve a “Gold” listing in the Electronic Products Environmental Assessment Tool. And the The HP rp5700 Business Desktop PC was the first product to meet the requirements that comprise the “gold” status of EPEAT.

In February, the company announced it had recycled nearly 250 million pounds of hardware and print cartridges in 2007, a 50 percent increase over 2006.

HP officials have pledged to reduce emissions from operations and the use of its products by six million tons below 2005 levels by 2010. And at this year’s CES, HP announced a commitment to cut energy consumption across its entire lineup of volume desktop and notebook PCs 25 percent by 2010.

Other initiatives announced today by HP include a carbon footprint calculator to assess energy and paper usage for printers, LaserJet printers with an Auto-On/Auto-Off feature, packaging that eliminates the need for an outer corrugated box and extensive foam, and a new HP paper policy.

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