February 8, 2008—Channel Intelligence, Inc. (CI) and the Green Electronics Council (GEC), which manages the EPEAT green computer rating system, recently announced they have entered an alliance to provide wider availability of information on products compliant with the EPEAT standard.
The alliance is designed to help increase awareness and purchases of green electronics through the integration of EPEAT registration status into online product descriptions on e-commerce Web sites.
The EPEAT system, which was developed by manufacturers and other stakeholders and supported by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), evaluates computer desktops, laptops, and monitors based on 51 environmental criteria.
All EPEAT registered products must meet 23 mandatory environmental performance criteria. An additional 28 optional criteria are used to determine whether products earn EPEAT Gold, Silver, or Bronze status. EPEAT is a required specification for federal purchasers, and is increasingly used by state and local government purchasers as well as private sector IT managers.
Retailers have long been interested in showing which products are EPEAT registered, but have struggled with keeping their Web pages up to date, says GEC. The alliance between GEC and CI is expected to provide purchasers in the public and private sectors with real-time information to evaluate, compare, and select products based on their compliance with the EPEAT standard.
Soon EPEAT Gold, Silver, or Bronze registration marks will appear on retail Web sites along with other product information provided by Channel Intelligence, and changes to EPEAT registration status will be updated globally in near real time.
