Consumers have filed a lawsuit against Apple, alleging that the company’s assertion that three Apple Watch models — Series 9, SE, and Ultra 2 — are “carbon neutral” is deceptive and inaccurate. Seven buyers of these environmentally branded watches stated in a complaint lodged Wednesday in federal court in San Jose, California, that they either would not have purchased the watches or would have paid a lower price if they had been aware of the actual facts.
Reuters:
Apple launched the watches in September 2023, saying they would be carbon neutral through a combination of lower emissions and purchases of carbon offsets.
But the plaintiffs — from California, Florida and Washington, D.C. — said two carbon offsetting projects on which Apple relied to meet its corporate emissions target did not provide “genuine” carbon reductions.
They said much of the land in Kenya’s Chyulu Hills Project lies within a national park protected from deforestation since 1983, while land for China’s Guinan Project was heavily covered by trees even before the project began in 2015.
“In both cases, the carbon reductions would have occurred regardless of Apple’s involvement or the projects’ existence,” the complaint said. “Because Apple’s carbon neutrality claims are predicated on the efficacy and legitimacy of these projects, Apple’s carbon neutrality claims are false and misleading.”
MacDailyNews Take: “I will buy no smartwatch whose production feeds trees and plants” is an interesting purchasing criterion.
MacDailyNews Note: The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages and an injunction blocking Apple from marketing the three Apple Watch models as “carbon neutral.”
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[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Fred Mertz” for the heads up.]
Apple will now have to settle and pay out cash due to Tim Cook’s laughable gullibility.
Imagine, Apple shareholders, if the company spent even half the time, money, and energy that they spend on this hooey on developing a usable Siri.
Imagine the emissions from Lisa Jackson alone.
Apple is clearly in the throes of delusion. They’ve forgotten the basic truth: Garbage In, Garbage Out. The garbage is “climate data” from those looking for “climate change” grants.
May they someday jettison both Cook and his umpteenth bad hire Jackson and finally get a clue.
“Climate Change” wealth redistribution is socialism in disguise which is why this former Obama admin lackey Jackson is pushing it so hard.
https://twitter.com/TruthDetector51/status/1631019169889091591
https://twitter.com/TruthDetector51/status/1592637121952899075
Tim Cook seems like a smart enough guy (good at ordering parts and keeping the prices Apple pays for components down, at least). I always wonder how much of this hokum he actually believes (if any) and how much of the anthropogenic climate change nonsense he just parrots in order to satisfy leftist nut-jobs and sell products to tree-huggers. (Unfortunately, I think he’s probably swallowed the whole scam hook, line, and sinker, but maybe he’s just a really great liar.)
“Climate change” is simply the UN cover for its global wealth redistribution scheme.
The people would never go along with it, so they have to be scared into it. Plus, very conveniently, no one will live long enough to see the scam revealed. It has all of the hallmarks of a con.
History is littered with scams, cons, and mass delusions. Many people fall for, and into, them, others are capable of independent thought. Eventually, the ruse is revealed and recorded in history with a chuckle and a sigh until the next scam comes along.
Stupid waste of court time and money.. We in the US will sue over anything..
Well, this is highly likely to be tossed by any “reasonable” judge. This is ambulance chasing at its finest. Ha!
What needs to be addressed is buying carbon emissions. Electricity is 100% fungible, therefor, Apple or any companies can pay MORE for electricity, to fund expensive windmills and solar farms (and they get tax credits as a result – all really dumb convoluted games), but the bottom line is that power coming over those lines could be coming from hydro, coal, wind, etc… it’s all power.
But because they paid more for it, or for a certain portion of their bill they can claim “carbon neutral” nonsense, but coal plants are burning away big-time to give them power.
It’s all a huge game. And when the clouds are in, it’s night-time, there is no wind, yah, Apple and everyone else are getting power from coal or natural gas Period.
So is their energy consumption “carbon neutral” for anything? Of course not. Not even close. They have tons of coal use in their operations, their sub-suppliers on and on. But if they buy enough “Carbon Credits” and pay more for their electricity they can make the claim “Carbon Neutral” for just about anything they want, depending how much of that expensive electricity they want to pay for.
In this case, they said “let’s apply that to the watches” okay.
Nothing wrong with this. It’s the way it’s set up. It’s just misleading to the average Joe and not an honest system in the end.
What needs to happen, is actual, effective, regulation (that would be a shock!).
If and when companies choose to buy more expensive energy to pay for windmills and solar farms, that’s what they can state: “And Apple continues to invest in Windmill, Solar and other alternate energy sources for power production.”
What any company should not be allowed to claim is carbon neutral nonsense.
And of course, if they can’t, and can’t “look good” then they won’t buy pay extra for energy they already need anyway, and their internal costs will go down, and Apple can pass some on and pocket the rest. However they want to play it.
But until then, this nonsense is not going to change.
As I come full circle, maybe this lawsuit was a good thing after all, to flush out how stupid this all is.
I say keep with the neutrality, Tim. It does and will make a difference in the long term. Best to error on the safe side anyway, besides, what’s the worst that could happen otherwise? A cooler summer? I’m in.
Give them their money back, and a Starbucks gift card and call it a day.
Carbon neutrality…like net zero is the ultimate deception. It does not exist…other than to fund the pockets of those driving the scam.
Helsinki Airport actually claims to be ‘carbon neutral’. What a bunch of abject lying ass dogs.