America’s Greenest Companies

Industry Sector: Technology Equipment
NEWSWEEK Green Score: 74.7%
Environmental Impact: 66.4%
Environmental Management: 88.6%
Transparency & Disclosure: 49.3%

In addition to the standard efforts to stay green, Dell has taken advantage of innovations in packaging—using mushroom and bamboo packaging to wrap the products the company ships. The mushroom packaging is biodegradable and can later be used as compost or mulch. In 2010, the company even launched an initiative to track the carbon footprints of individual products in order to reduce them in the future. In manufacturing, the company aims to have a 99 percent rate of recycling and reuse by 2012 and it looks like they are on right on track—for the fiscal year of 2011, the company maintained a recycle and reuse rate of 95.7 percent. The company provides easy ways for its customers to stay green as well. Dell’s Reconnect program provides an easy way for customers to recycle old computers and products, by returning them to a Goodwill store for refurbishment, reuse, or recycling. The company says that the program has kept more than 190 million pounds of e-waste from landfills and created 250 green jobs.