Apple and ChemFORWARD Collaboration Offers Affordable, Verified Data on Safer Cleaners to Protect Worker Health
ChemFORWARD’s work with Apple to share a list of verified, assessed safe cleaners and degreasers has been highlighted in the sustainability and innovation leader’s 2021 Environmental Progress Report.
This work, along with sharing Apple’s evaluation framework, will enable safer chemical choices and improve worker conditions throughout the electronics industry and beyond. This collection of information will clearly show which products are safer, while making the underlying chemical hazard data more consistent and lower cost to suppliers seeking to be listed in the repository.
ChemFORWARD and Apple are collaborating to develop criteria for cleaning products based on the United Nations’ Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labelling of Chemicals and leverage our existing platform to support the sharing of high-quality, actionable chemical hazard data via our globally harmonized repository.
A grant from Apple will support ChemFORWARD’s work to assess and verify safer alternatives to cleaners commonly used in the electronics industry as well as continuing to develop a platform to make this information widely accessible and comprehensible.
“This leadership in not only using safer chemicals but promoting their use and developing tools to share this information beyond its own suppliers and even its own industry shows Apple’s commitment to transforming value chains to be safer and more circular,” said Stacy Glass, ChemFORWARD’s executive director. “Partnerships like this one make the world safer for humans, businesses and the environment and we couldn’t be happier to participate in this collaboration.”
The Cupertino, California-based technology giant is one of the world’s most innovative in sustainability, leading initiatives on clean energy and zero carbon footprint and working to source 100 percent recycled materials. The company’s Smarter Chemistry efforts include regulated substances specifications, toxicological assessments of materials selected for Apple products and a protocol for prioritizing chemicals of concern in the electronics industry.
ChemFORWARD is a science-based, nonprofit collaboration of brands, retailers, suppliers, and environmental organizations that share high-quality, actionable chemical hazard data and safer alternatives via a globally harmonized repository.