CES 2008: Green round up – Green Plug, Nokia, Marvell

Over the last few weeks much of the speculation surrounding CES 2008 has been that it will be the first in which consumer electronics companies start to parade green products. Well judging by what happened yesterday when the major makers all held their press conferences very little has changed.

The big news was that Sony, Panasonic and other makers announced a joint campaign to recycle gadgets. While we heartily cheer the news it means very little to UK consumers as 1 it is US only. 2 In Europe we have the fantastically named Wii directive which in theory does the same thing.

CES 2008: The greenwash begins

On Sunday night Bill Gates takes to the stage at the Venetian Ballroom for CES’s curtain raising keynote speech, and each year he delivers a surprise guest to play Eric to his Ernie. It is probably a long shot but I wonder if tomorrow’s star turn will be none other than Mr Inconvenient Truth Al Gore.

At a CES where gadgets are starting to look a little commoditised – bet we don’t see those swathes of MP3 players, PVPs and flash camcorders of previous years – makers are having to come up with new ideas to persuade us to trade in pounds for new gadgets. And what better way to do this than with a bit of greenwash.