HP Not The Worst Toxic Company On Greenpeace's Tech Toxic List

Greenpeace has painted Hewlett-Packard as a toxic tech leader, but what about Microsoft, Lenovo and other companies it ranks as worse offenders?

On Tuesday, the organization painted the Palo Alto, Calif.-based company's roof, writing "Hazardous Products" across 11,500 square feet.

Greenpeace alleges that the computer giant has backtracked on its "commitment" to eliminate PVC and brominated flame retardants (BFRs) in computing products by end of 2009, and instead said it wouldn't be ready until 2011. HP further drew the ire of the group since it purportedly doesn't have any products on the market free of these toxic substances, according to Greenpeace.

On its Web site, HP defended itself by saying that brominated flame retardants (BFRs) and PVC have "proved difficult to substitute entirely because of the lack of suitable alternatives for some uses."

"Over the last ten years, HP has proactively eliminated most uses of these materials from our products, with limited exceptions. For example, we still use certain BFRs in printed-circuit boards because suitable alternatives are not yet available. As technologically feasible alternatives become readily available that will not compromise product performance or quality and will not adversely impact health or the environment, we will complete the phase out of BFR and PVC in newly introduced personal computing products in 2011."

However, other companies such as Microsoft, Lenovo, Dell and others have garnered worse scores on Greenpeace's tech toxic list.

One place ahead of HP, Greenpeace accused Dell also of backtracking on its commitment to eliminate PVC and BFRs in all its products by the end of 2009, and in fact "Dell no longer has a timeline for eliminating these nasty substances which means there is no commitment to phase them out entirely," the group said.

Microsoft was deemed the next worst company after HP, and earned points for promising to remove toxic chemicals from its hardware by 2010.

Scoring below Microsoft, Lenovo was called out for backtracking on its commitment to eliminate PVC and brominated flame retardants (BFRs) in all its products by the end of 2009. Greenpeace said that Lenovo's new timeline for meeting this commitment by the end of 2010 is to be dropped and there is no new timeline.

Scoring behind Lenovo, Greenpeace said that Fujitsu is the "weakest on chemicals, scoring points for having a chemical management system in place and for committing to eliminate some phthalates in PCs by 2013."

The group said that Fujitsu now plans to totally abolish the use of PVC and the Brominated Flame Retardant (BFR) HBCDD in PCs---and only PCs---by the end of 2013, but doesn't score any points on this criterion as it does not commit to phase out all BFRs.

Nintendo was the biggest alleged offender on the Greenpeace list. While the gaming giant has partially put out new consoles that are out that are PVC-free, it has not set a timeline for its phase out. "It continues to score zero on all e-waste criteria," Greenpeace said.

The tech firms on Greenpeace's list are, in order of best to worst: Nokia; Samsung; Sony Ericsson; LG Electronics; Toshiba; Motorola; Philips; Sharp; Acer; Panasonic; Apple; Sony; Dell; HP; Microsoft; Lenovo; Fujitsu; and Nintendo.