Apple's annual gadget-fest was, as expected, a slickly produced and somewhat formulaic affair. But this year unveiled the biggest change to the iPhone's design in more than a decade.
The company confirmed speculation that it would ditch its proprietary Lightning cable (you know, the one that charges your iPhone and, frustratingly, little else) and embrace a more ubiquitous charging port called USB-C (which is compatible with other Apple and non-Apple devices).
That means one less cord cluttering your nightstand. One less thing to forget when packing for a weekend getaway. No more frustration if you find yourself with a low battery in a room full of Android users.
But the move, hastened by a European regulatory mandate passed last year, won't do much to shrink the mountains of e-waste piling up around the globe. And it may only matter for a short time until wireless charging becomes the norm.
Some background
When the European Commission passed the directive last year, it cited two motivations:
- First, everyone agrees it is super annoying to have so many cables lying around.
- Second, having a common charger across devices — whether they're made by Apple or Samsung or Garmin or whoever — would "significantly reduce electronic waste."
Apple initially pushed back, of course, because selling extra Lightning cables made it lots of money. But it ultimately caved.
Retiring the Lightning cable could generate, in the short term, a surge of e-waste once iPhone users begin tossing their useless Lightning cables in a drawer. (Which, to be clear, isn't recommended. Apple says it has a "robust" recycling program where you can bring in used chargers and cables. You can also look for a local e-waste recycling center or Best Buy store for a more environmentally friendly option.)
Big picture
The impact on the mountains of global e-waste will likely be minimal.
There are about 66 million tons of electronic waste generated each year, says Ruediger Kuehr, head of the United Nations University's Sustainable Cycles Program. Charging cables, he said, account for "a few hundred thousand tons."
"When we look to the pure numbers, it's close to nothing," Kuehr said. "But we nevertheless think it's a very important step in order to make people ... aware of the issue we are facing."
E-waste is a growing problem that has yet to enter the mainstream consciousness. Most of it ends up where it shouldn't — in our closets and junk drawers — which means more materials such as copper, gold and platinum have to be mined to produce new products.
"You can make money out of it, but you have to really do a lot of steps," Kuehr says. "This is not understandable for the consumer in comparison to all the other waste streams."
To Apple's credit, it has been "a leader in scraping off rare earth metals from its reuse pile to recover these expensive materials," says Marian Chertow, a professor of industrial environmental management at the Yale School of the Environment. Last year, Apple reused more than two-thirds of the aluminum it needed.
Bottom line: Apple's overdue pivot to USB-C is a small step toward reducing cord clutter in our lives, though it's not quite an e-waste panacea.
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