CES 2010: Review and Outlook of Green Tech

I just returned from the CES show in Las Vegas and it was the first year I went in search of sustainable and eco-friendly companies and product lines.

Overall the future seems very bright for green technology and most products seem to be everyday items that will hopefully just become a part of everyday life in the next 1-2 years.

Here is a little recap of the show:

My first day at the show I met with HP, who is the number 1 Greenest Tech company (according to Newsweek's 2009 list).  HP has set a mission to have their whole product line sustainable by 2011.  A lofty goal, but the team I spoke with seemed confident that they could attain that goal.

HP debuted their 8000f Desktop, the first Wall-to-Mouse BFR/PVC Free PC.  Yup even the wires in the system are BFR/PVC free.  This model is geared for the corporate industry and will retail at approximately $900.  The key is that they have set the standard and hopefully others will follow the path.

As I continued to walk the floor I cam across several smaller sized companies that had eco-friendly items, such as an eco remote control and even a company named EcoMount that has sustainable LCD TV Mounts.

These products were in their early stages especially the remote control and it was not the product being featured but it made me feel good that these items are on the way.

As I made my way to the Sustainable Planet section of the floor I was looking for ward to see what was on display and along the way I noticed Nokia had a cell phone recycling center where attendees could drop their old cell phones off.  Of course the display was more for show and to let potential buyers know that this is a service they do offer for retail channels.

Some of it was the standard green tech, but knowing that CES had a dedicated area for eco-friendly products was also a great sign of the future.

There was no real ground breaking Green Tech, although seeing the use of solar panels in everyday items and various versions of LED (residential and commercial) lighting was cool. Solio who we featured in our Holiday Shopping Guide last month had some good representation and their sleek solar chargers for cell phones were on display.  Regen also had a sleek contemporary like of solar products including a futuristic solar desk lamp and very modern looking speakers with iPod/phone docks.

Additionally, we met a small manufacturer with a simple everyday calculator running on WATER, which could be the wave of the future.  Although, water is probably not the most ideal resource we want to use up to run our electronics.

Our second and third days at the show was spent meeting some of the big guns of the industry including, Sony, Toshiba, Samsung and Panasonic.  Each of the Big Tech companies had a good portion of their booths (about 3-5%) dedicated to their Eco Products.  However, Panasonic and Toshiba were the only companies to have any representation to speak about the product lines and the folks at Panasonic were the actual tech guys behind the concepts so that was good to see.  Toshiba had a representative to talk just about their e-cyclying program and they confirmed that next month they will be revamping it and be trying to push it out to the public even more.

As we tried to get more info about the upcoming eco products, we quickly learned that LCD ECO TVs were the most common everyday mainstream product among the big players.  Most of the companies had a standard LCD TV next to their Eco TVs (energy efficient) and a digital (LED) display to show the difference in power consumption.  Once again probably not ground breaking and technology that should be a part of their TVs today.

Toshiba had a notebook with an "Eco-Button" on their laptops.  The button when pressed would bring up your power settings and unique software that allowed you to set the computer's consumption based on your potential usage and to maximize the energy efficiency.  HP had a similar power control panel that you could see the approximate cost savings based on the current power setting.

Panasonic had the most dedicated area of their booth for their "Eco Ideas" and we were very impressed with the items as they had a section dedicated to Residential Fuel Cell Technology and Solar Panels.

Leaving the show, I personally had a very good feeling of what to expect in the near future and my only hope is that these companies and their product lines become more mainstream for the everyday consumer.

Honestly yes some will use the tag "Eco" or "Green" for marketing purposes but all they have to do is implement the technology across the board and make it the standard.

Can't wait to see the technology in the retail channels and I am looking forward to Green 2010 in consumer technology!

Here are over 60 photos from the floor of CES 2010 covering all the various companies and products we discussed above.

NOTE: We will be posting our favorite green gadgets from CES 2010 soon!