Component 1- Another 5 articles

According to the article written by Jennifer L. Schenker taken from the businessweek.com website dated December 7,2007, Royal Philips Electronics , Europe's largest electronics company has come out with new products due to well-timed acquisitions, rapid technology shifts, and growing interest in saving energy. The surprising fact is lighting accounts for about one-fifth of all electricity use—in part because traditional incandescent bulbs waste most of their energy in heat.
New solid-state alternatives made from light-emitting diodes (LEDs) burn cooler and can produce the same amount of illumination using, on average, 40% less electricity. With the global push to go green, that's a compelling savings—and it's driving surging demand for next-generation bulbs and fixtures. Philips reckons that Europe could meet its 2010 Kyoto carbon dioxide targets in one fell swoop if all traditional lighting were switched to energy-efficient alternatives. The energy saved would equate to 50 million barrels of oil per year. The promise of such large energy savings is starting to resonate with Philips' customers. In the first half of this year, sales of energy-efficient lighting products grew at twice the rate of the lighting division as a whole, and for the first time accounted for almost 50% of its sales.
Another company, Silicon Valley's Applied Materials (AMAT), the world leader in chip making equipment has been producing high-precision manufacturing gear for semiconductors and flat-panel displays for almost 40years. Now it's racing to sell specialized machines that churn out solar panels more cheaply and in higher volumes than ever before. The immediate goal is to drive down the cost-per-watt of solar electricity by at least 25%. "Applied has a history of using technology and smart engineering to lower cost and grow markets," says Chief Executive Mike Splinter. "We see a real opportunity to change the cost equation for solar power through adoption of our existing technology and new innovation."
Company like General Electric (GE) is also at the pace of producing energy saving devices. According to the article which was written by Matthew Boyle taken from FORTUNE 500 Magazine dated November 12,2007, General Electric's improvement is attributable almost entirely to its environmental efforts. The company's highly visible "ecomagination" campaign aims to more than double its annual research budget for cleaner technologies - like energy-efficient refrigerators and wind turbines_ from $700 million in 2005 to $1.5 billion in 2010.
Besides than producing energy saving devices, company like EPSON focus of the energy saving activities was switched from production equipment to facilities, which offered greater potential of energy savings. The company is dedicated to creating ‘green factory’ which is the new LCD fab at the Toyoshina Plant. Epson implements energy saving measures in each stage of the manufacturing process. This has the effect of eliminating waste since the beginning of the planning process. Using the experience Epson has gained from environmental innovations taken at other electronic device production facilities such as Suwa Minami Plant in Japan and Suzhou Epson Co., Ltd. In China, the new plant at Toyoshina has emerged as a model “green factory” that serves as an example for energy-saving manufacturing both inside and outside the Epson Group.
Unlike many plants, where electricity usage is considered as a total amount, the electricity requirements of the new plant have been individually measured and listed by process, and analyzed for energy saving potential. These calculations were not simply made for production equipment, but also for the energy used in plant facilities for powering air conditioning and water-cooling.
Hewlett Packard (HP) announced a variety of affordable, energy-efficient desk-based products and environmentally friendly features for business customers on Nov, 15 2006. Available today, the new HP Compaq dx2250 Desktop PC is a reliable, full-featured business computer featuring energy-efficient processors to help lower a customer’s total cost of ownership. HP also plans to offer 80 percent efficient power supplies on select desktop business PCs. The optional power supplies offer greater energy savings to customers and will allow HP to meet the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) recently announced ENERGY STAR® 4.0 requirements in January 2007 – a full six months before the new guidelines take effect.
HP additionally announced a trade-in program to make it more affordable for customers to obtain thin client technology – which uses the lowest watt processors of any business computing option – while disposing of old technology in an environmentally responsible manner. “As the world’s largest PC manufacturer, HP understands there’s a lot at stake when it comes to energy efficiency, from the rising cost of resources to the environmental impact,” said Jeff Groudan, vice president, Business PC Marketing, Personal Systems Group, HP. “We continue to proactively design, develop and incorporate energy-saving technologies into our products.”
As part of HP’s commitment to reducing the environmental impact of its customers, partners and suppliers, the company works with industry and government groups to promote energy-saving programs and consistent global standards. For example, HP is the only major PC manufacturer to have 36 products registered at the Silver rating with EPEAT, an online procurement tool to help institutional purchasers in the public and private sectors evaluate, compare and select desktop computers, notebooks and monitors based on their environmental attributes. In addition to a broad lineup of full-featured business PCs, HP is also the industry’s fastest growing major thin client manufacturer. Thin clients offer improved security and manageability at a lower cost than traditional desktop PCs. And with just 9-watt processors, thin clients are also the most energy-efficient desktop client option.