Printer manufacturers voluntarily agree to “green” industry through environmental targets.
A number of OEMs have agreed to abide by self-regulatory measures to meet targets that intend to reduce their printing and copying carbon footprint in the EU, with the targets covering energy efficient devices, ink and paper use and recycling of devices and ink cartridges, reports Computer World UK.
Among the OEMs signing up to the agreement are Brother, Canon, Dell, Epson Europe, HP, Konica Minolta, Kyocera Mita, Lexmark, Murata Machinery, OKI, Panasonic, Ricoh, Samsung, Sharp, Toshiba and Xerox; with the companies setting up the EuroVAprint organisation in order to ensure that their environmental efforts are able to be checked and evaluated by third parties.
The voluntary agreement, which has been backed by the European Commission, will also see the manufacturers undertake measures to encourage the use of duplex printing and “N-up” printing, where multiple pages are printed onto the same sheet of paper, in order to reduce paper usage.
Commenting on the agreement, the European Commission said: “The voluntary agreement has undergone a thorough impact assessment and we have concluded that it could be considered equivalent to binding regulations adopted under the EU’s 2009 Ecodesign Directive.”
William Dazy, Chairman of the new EuroVAprint organisation, said: “We welcome the Commission’s endorsement of our voluntary agreement in the context of the Ecodesign Directive. We are looking forward to further cooperation with the EU institutions in this area.”