It’s not made of recycled toilet paper and it doesn’t draw energy directly from the heart of the sun, but the fact that it is made from recycled plastic and Sony Ericsson couldn’t be bothered including a manual means that the virtually unheard of Sony Ericsson Elm has been awarded the prestigious (in some peoples’ eyes we’re sure it’s loaded with prestige) title of being O2’s greenest handset. To be fair, Sony Ericsson did also go to the trouble of stamping their GreenHeart branding on the allegedly low power charger.
O2 has listed 65 of its mobile phone and smartphone handsets in order of how green they are. Apple and RIM (they make Blackberry handsets by the way) turned down the opportunity to have their phones ranked in the list and while Apple has had little to say on the subject, RIM have at least said that they should be included by the first quarter of next year.
The rankings were awarded by O2 in conjunction with Forum for the Future and were based on the environmental impact the phone had during manufacture and use. It also considered packaging and other aspects.
Scoring a 4.3 out of 5 the Elm (which must be environmentally friendly because it’s named after a tree) took top spot of the list which included 93% of the provider’s handsets (although in terms of market share you’d have to question that figure).
Honourable mentions needed to go to almost all of the rest of the phones in the list with the Nokia 1800, Nokia 6700, Nokia C7, Samsung GT-S8500, Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini, Sony Ericsson Mini Pro, and Sony Ericsson Zylo all scoring 4 out of 10.
The Palm Pre Plus should be ashamed of its performance bagging just 2.7 out of 10 and at the bottom of the pile showing that you basically have a choice between feature rich or smug green.
Will you be rushing out to buy the Sony Ericsson Elm (it’s cheap, at least)?
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