How green is the iPhone?

Well thanks to the folks over at Geekaphone, you won’t have to do the research yourself. They’ve come up with a handy infographic to let us know how friendly the iPhone is to the environment. So how green is the iPhone? Well, it definitely doesn’t rank up there as one of the greenest phones available (Nokia owns a handful of those titles with their Symbian phones), but it’s not terrible either.

View the complete infographic at Geekaphone’s website. Here are some of the highlights of the infographic:

• 300,000 workers in China earn less than $10 a day assembling iPhones.
• iPhones purchased in 2010 contributed to 2350 million kg of CO2 being released into the atmosphere: 57% production, 34% consumer use, 8% transportation, 1% recycling.
• If all the iPhones sold in 2010 were charged once it would be equal to leaving a normal light bulb on for over 357 years.
• Less than 10% of phones are recycled (42,300,000 trashed, 4,700,000 recycled) even though Apple offers free and environmentally sensitive recycling of its phones.
• The iPhone emits 1.19 w/kg SAR radiation: just under 2 1/2 times lower than the level causing behavioral changes in animals.
• The original iPhone contained the hazardous chemicals PVC and bromine

While most of the stats don’t paint the phone in a good light, it’s comforting to know that Apple offers free and environmentally sensitive recycling of its phones, and its power adaptor exceeds global energy efficiency standards. How many of you recycled your iPhones before you upgraded?

George Wong
Categories: Apple, Cellphones, Green
Tags: Apple Inc, infographic, iOS, iPhone