Desktop computers

We seem to be obsessed with the advancement of technology, but are we working towards a sustainable relationship with it, or are we in a society of PC gone mad?

In the following guides, we rank the biggest brands in the PC industry according to their ethical policies and performance. We also look at some lesser-known companies that are offering more sustainable alternatives.

Desktop PCs and conflict minerals

Conflict minerals have, for a long time, been defined by policymakers under the umbrella term 3TG: tantalum, tin, tungsten and gold. 

In recent years it has frequently been suggested that the trade in cobalt, of which 75% of the world’s supply is mined in DRC, is similarly linked to the conflict in the region. However, cobalt is not specified in existing conflict minerals legislation.
 
These five chemical elements are widely used in electronic and electrical devices including PCs and mobile phones as follows, although each has multiple other uses:

• tantalum is commonly used for capacitors on circuit boards
• tin in solder
• tungsten is used in phone vibration mechanisms
• gold is in connectors
• cobalt is widely used in the production of batteries

The desktop computer brands in this guide were ranked for on conflict minerals usage.

Find out more about conflict minerals and how we rate companies for their use.

Toxic chemicals in PCs

Among the dozens of elements and compounds used in the production of electronic devices are numerous substances known to be toxic to human health and the natural environment.

The table below shows how the brands in this guide score for their toxic chemical use and policies.

Polyvinyl chloride (PVC) and Brominated flame retardants (BFRs) are two substances often used in the plastic parts of electronic devices. Both substances are known to produce harmful by-products, such as highly toxic and carcinogenic dioxins, which can be released at various stages of a product’s lifecycle.

The danger becomes acute after the disposal of a device, when plastics are often burned in incinerators or by workers in informal recycling operations, releasing dioxins directly into the air. This is one of the reasons why e-waste is such a huge problem.

Phthalates are a group of chemicals often used as a softener in PVC. Over time, they leak out of plastic materials into the surrounding environment and have been linked to a wide range of health problems affecting the liver, kidneys, lungs and reproductive systems.

In the European Union, the RoHS Directive restricts the use of toxic substances in electronics, including a number of BFRs and, as of 2019, four phthalates. However, different companies use different definitions and acceptable thresholds more measuring toxics, and focusing solely on the phasing out of known chemicals risks rewarding companies that just swap one toxic for a lesser known but no less dangerous one.

For example, Apple, receives our best rating in this category. Although it openly declares that trace levels of toxic chemicals remain in certain products, it publicly discloses its thresholds for acceptable concentrations.

Huawei on the other hand, simply makes a broad claim to have “banned the use of six harmful substances in our mobile phones, tablets, and wearables”. While this may sound superficially impressive, it says nothing about the presence of toxics in, say, Huawei’s charging cables, a key use of BFRs. Huawei received our worst rating.

Working conditions and workers’ rights in the tech industry

We looked at the supply chain and workers' rights in the tech industry, and unfortunately it's a low scoring area for most companies making desktop PCs.

Inadequate working conditions are a persistent issue in the IT supply chain.

Conditions in Chinese electronics factories have frequently made headlines for low wages, excessive working hours, forced overtime and insufficient breaks, and even the limited labour laws that do exist are frequently violated. Read our feature on workers rights and technology in order to see how this manifests.

Furthermore, find out why overall, only one of the PC brands we rated in this guide met the criteria for our best rating for Supply Chain Management.

The carbon cost of desktops

The contribution of IT and the electronics sector to climate change is a growing problem, with studies suggesting that the production and use of electronic devices will account for 14% of total greenhouse gas emissions by 2040, which equates to one half of today’s global transport sector.

We rated the companies making desktop PCs for their carbon emissions reporting.

Like the gadgets themselves, the issue is highly complex, with emissions occurring throughout the lifecycle of a product: resource extraction, multiple stages of manufacture, transportation, use and disposal all contribute significantly to the climate impact of a device.

The production stage is often the most significant – for smartphones, this has been estimated to account for 75% of emissions. The complexity of the product means it requires large amounts of energy to manufacture, although the quantities are difficult to measure as a myriad of materials and components need to be processed and assembled by different companies along a huge supply chain 

Broadening the scope of reporting

The Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Protocol defines a set of standards to assist companies with measuring and tracking their climate impact in real terms by separating emissions sources into three categories known as Scopes.

Scope 1 covers direct emissions produced by a company’s own facilities, while scope 2 accounts for the emissions caused by electricity use of the company.*Reported limited data defined as Scope 3 such as employee travel but did not include supply chain or product-use emissions.

Scope 3 takes into account “all other indirect emissions”, including those produced in the supply chain, product use and disposal as well as other activities such as business travel.

Although much more difficult to measure, Scope 3 emissions generally account for the largest share of a company’s carbon footprint. This is particularly true for electronics manufacturers, where so much energy use occurs outside of each company’s direct control.

Despite this, we found that not all companies we assessed measured and reported on scope 3 emissions. The level of reporting by each company is shown in the table below.

Short lifecycles are a driver for climate change

Perhaps the most effective way to limit the climate impact of your gadgets is by extending their life. A 2019 EU report compared the total emissions of ‘use’ and ‘non-use’ phases of their lifecycles. For notebooks, ‘non-use phases’ account for between 40% and 64% of the total Global Warming Potential (GWP), while the same figure for smartphones was between 51% and 92%.

As electricity supplies in some countries move gradually towards renewables, this proportion becomes even greater, particularly as the vast majority of electronics manufacturing takes place in China and other East Asian countries, where coal and other fossil fuels account for the majority of electricity supply.

This means that improvements in energy-efficient design rarely compensate for the impact of production when a device is replaced with a new one, with calculations suggesting that a smartphone may be used for between 25 and 232 years before it becomes environmentally beneficial to replace!

For consumers, this is yet another good reason to repair devices wherever possible, or else to buy second-hand or refurbished products.

How much energy do desktop PCs use?

The power consumption is largely dependent on what type of processor (CPU) is used in the machine. Our IT team, Open Plan IT, recommend you look out for low power processors such as the Intel Atom which also requires no fan so machines are virtually silent. The 'Thermal Design Power' is what you’re after. It ranges from about 4w for some of the Atoms and VIA processors to over 130w for some of the Pentium D models.

Our favourite website for checking power consumption of consumer electricals easily is Sust-it. 

When choosing a lower power machine aim for the best power consumption you can.

Can you use less energy when using a desktop PC?

The amount of energy a computer uses is dependent on what the computer is doing. If you are playing games with graphics, charging or streaming video, then your processor will be working hard and be using more electricity than if you are just running a word processing program.

But even when the machine is just turned on or ‘idle’, it could be using up to 100KW/h. Computers apparently can use energy when connected to the power supply even when turned off, so it’s worth unplugging them at the end of the day or turning them off at the wall.

To minimise energy use the advice is to make full use of the computer’s power management tools (found in the Control Panel in Windows operating systems) so that it powers down and ‘hibernates’ when not in use.

Are there any low energy desktop computers?

According to Sust-it, Apple Mac and Dell Optiplex desktops are the most energy efficient desktops on the market when ranked by annual power consumption.

Tax avoidance in the tech industry

Ethical Consumer rated companies on the likely use of tax avoidance strategies based on whether they listed subsidiaries in countries or regions on our list of known tax havens.

Companies with two or more subsidiaries considered to be high-risk within these areas were given our worst rating, unless they published country-by-country financial information, a policy statement or narrative explanation that could explain a different purpose for these subsidiaries.

Shockingly, every PC brand rated in this guide received our worst rating for the likely use of tax avoidance.