by Brianna Crandall — March 20, 2017 — UL Environment, a business division of global safety science leader UL (Underwriters Laboratories), and the Green Electronics Council (GEC), managers of the EPEAT program, recently announced a collaboration enabling sustainable mobile phones certified to the ANSI/UL 110 sustainability standard to also be featured on the EPEAT Registry, which is used by public and private institutional purchasers globally to identify and buy sustainable information technology (IT) products.
The UL ECOLOGO/EPEAT Joint Certification is now available for brands that wish to certify mobile phones to the latest version of the UL 110 standard and make them eligible for procurements and tenders that require EPEAT-registered products. Facilities managers involved in specifying and procuring mobile phones for their staff, company or government agency will be able to take advantage of this joint certification.
UL ECOLOGO/EPEAT Joint Certification logo
In light of “pent-up purchaser demand” for sustainable mobile phones, according to GEC, the EPEAT listing gives provides government and corporate purchasers a credible source for identifying and buying sustainable mobile phones so they can continue to leverage their buying power to meet their organizations’ sustainability goals.
The UL 110 standard will be published as an ANSI standard on March 24, 2017. A new mobile phone category on the EPEAT Registry, based on the new UL 110 standard, is anticipated to be available to purchasers on July 1.
Leading global brands and wireless service providers are reportedly committed to the upcoming EPEAT mobile phone category and the UL ECOLOGO/EPEAT Joint Certification process. Several of the world’s most popular mobile-phone brands have already begun the pre-assessment process for UL ECOLOGO/EPEAT Joint Certification, while wireless carriers worldwide have expressed interest in working with vendors to require phones that carry the UL ECOLOGO/EPEAT joint certification mark.
Mobile phones that earn the UL ECOLOGO/EPEAT joint certification mark will have achieved certification to a lifecycle-based standard specifically tailored for sustainable mobile phones and are subject to ongoing verification through EPEAT. This unprecedented combination of pre- and post-market auditing demonstrates to purchasers the enhanced credibility of brands’ sustainability claims.
UL Environment began the process of updating UL 110 in 2013, two years after a widely adopted draft standard debuted to establish life-cycle criteria for mobile phones. The updated multi-attribute standard addresses environmental criteria such as materials, packaging and energy use, as well as sustainability criteria such as end-of-life management and extension of useful life, manufacturing and operations, and corporate practices.
More information about the standard development process, UL 110 criteria and the joint certification for sustainable mobile phones is available on the ECOLOGO/EPEAT Joint Certification page on the ULE Web site.
