CONSUMER ELECTRONICS SHOW 2009:THE CONSUMER Electronics Association, organisers of CES, as well as its exhibitors have been making much of their green credentials but Greenpeace, for one, believes they could be doing more.

Last year CES partnered with carbonfund.org to offset the approximately 20,000 tonnes of carbon that the show generates.

In the central hall of the Las Vegas Convention Centre, a greener gadgets zone showcased everything from the first hydrogen-powered mobile phone charger to electric bikes and scooters.

While eco-friendly claims were two-a-penny at CES, and Greenpeace conceded that “the greenest consumer electronic products on the market today have a smaller environmental footprint than those sold a year ago”, the environmental group says the industry has to do better.

“They need to use less toxins in the manufacture of their products, have better energy efficiency and operate a takeback programme at the end of their life,” said Daniel Kessler, a spokesman for Greenpeace in the US. “The proof has to be in the pudding.”

Many large electronics companies introduced greener products at CES. Sony launched a line of Bravia Eco televisions that it claims use 40 per cent less power than standard models and consume no power when on standby. They will go on sale this summer.

Stan Glasgow, president of Sony Electronics US, said the company’s goal is to “recycle a pound of waste for every pound of product we sell”.

NComputing, makers of a virtualisation system which allows a single PC to be shared between 10 sets of screens, keyboards and mice, claims to need just one watt of power for each virtual device versus 110 for a standalone PC.

Motorola showed off the W323 Renew which, it claims, is the first carbon-free mobile phone, with casing made from recycled water bottles and an envelope in the box so that it can be sent back for recycling at the end of its useful life.

Mr Kessler welcomed the initiative from Motorola but said the phone still contained toxic chemicals and asked why it could not include a similar envelope with all its phones.

To coincide with CES, Greenpeace published its annual test of electronics devices which claim to be green. The winning device was Lenovo’s L2440x widescreen computer monitor, which scored 6.9 points out of 10.

Companies that declined to submit products for testing were Apple, Asus, Microsoft, Nintendo, Palm and Philips.