Owner's Manual

Environmental
Labelling
of Personal
Computers
Congratulations!
You
have
just purchased
a
TCO'95
approved
and labelled
product!
Your choice has
provided you
with
a
product developed
for
professional
use. Your
purchase
has also contributed to
reducing
the burden
on the
environment
and to the further
development
of
environmentally-
adapted
electronic
products.
Why
do we have
environmentally-labelled computers?
In
many
countries,
environmental
labelling
has become an established method
for
encouraging
the
adaptation
of
goods
and
services
to the
environment.
The main
problem
as far as
computers
and other electronic
equipment
are
concerned is that
environmentally
harmful substances are used both in the
products
and
during
their manufacture.
Since
it has not been
possible
so far
for the
majority
of electronic
equipment
to be
recycled
in a
satisfactory way,
most of these
potentially damaging
substances sooner or later enter Nature.
There are also other characteristics of a
computer,
such as
energy
consumption
levels,
that are
important
from both the
working
and natural
environment
viewpoints.
Since
all
types
of
conventional
electricity
generation
have
a
negative
effect on the
environment
(acidic-
and
climatic-influencing
emissions,
radioactive
waste,
etc.),
it is
vital
to
conserve
energy.
Electronic
equipment
in offices consumes as enormous amount of
energy,
since it is often
routinely
left
running continuously.
What does
labelling
involve?
This
product
meets the
requirements
for the
TCO'95
scheme,
which
provides
for international
environmental
labelling
of
personal computers.
The
labelling
scheme
was
developed
as a
joint
effort
by
the
TCO
(The
Swedish
Confederation
of Professional
Employees), Naturckyddsforeningen
(The
Swedish
Society
for Nature
Conservation),
and
NUTEK
(The
National
Board for Industrial and Technical
Development
in
Sweden),
and
SEMKO
AB
(an
international certification
agency).
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