[hezag]

  > "[...] The company cited environmental concerns for removing chargers with every purchase of the device and claimed that the decision will save 861,000 tons of copper, zinc and tin. The Brazilian Ministry of Justice remained unmoved by that reasoning, telling Apple that it could help the environment in other ways, such as giving its devices USB-C support."

Fair enough.

[datadata]

That seems high a really high amount of claimed saved metals. 2.2 billion iPhones have been sold ever globally, that is nearly one pound of metal per phone. I think these chargers weigh around 5oz, and that is not entirely metal.

But here we are only talking about Brazil. Maybe if they project 1000 of years of future sales the figure would make sense? It is also unreasonable to assume every charger is wasted. Some would be used or recycled.

[ericmay]

Yea I guess clarification here would be good but the final product probably takes more metal to make than what is in it to start with.

I don't buy the judge's argument about USB-C because the cable that comes with the phone has USB-C on the end that goes to a charging block so there aren't really any compatibility issues. Unless of course that judge was suggesting that Apple shouldn't include a power cable as well using a similar argument for not including the charging block being that "there are plenty around".

[datadata]

I would not assume wasted metal in manufacturing. These metals are all readily recyclable-- Especially at such a large scale in manufacturing and for a company that claims to want to reduce environmental impact.

[ericmay]

So if that's the case we can take Apple's numbers at face value then.

[zekrioca]

USB-C chargers are not common in Brazil. It has only been more common from last few years only. This lawsuit predates that.

[ratww]

Funnyly enough Apple's Brazilian PR team completely fumbled their response to the Ministry of Justice:

> Existem bilhões de adaptadores de energia USB-A já em uso em todo o mundo que nossos clientes podem usar para carregar e conectar seus dispositivos. [1]

> Translation: There are billions of USB-A power adapters already in use around the world that our customers can use to charge and connect their devices

Those "billions of USB-A adapters" however won't work with the cable provided in newer iPhones, which is lightning and USB-C.

[1] https://g1.globo.com/tecnologia/noticia/2022/09/06/ministeri...

[masklinn]

Is it? Most if not all phone chargers have detachable cables these days, so shouldn't Apple only need to bundle (or provide with any purchase) an A->Lightning or C->lightning cable?

[rootusrootus]

And they do exactly that right now (include a C->Lightning cable).

[pwinnski]

They supply a USB-C->Lightning cable, but nothing into which to plug the USB-C end of things.

[kramerger]

Yeah, that's hard to argue with assuming the fine does not include Apple devices that already use USB-C.

[madeofpalk]

Presumably switching to a different cable would generate a one-off 'landfill event' as people throw out their old cables and buy new ones?

Not saying Apple shouldn't make the move switch (and it's seemed likely for a while that it'll happen next year)

[dont__panic]

19 million dollars sounds like a lot of money to me, but it's minuscule to a company the size of Apple.

861,000 tons of copper, zinc, and tin sounds like a lot of metal to me. Is it minuscule at Apple's manufacturing scale?

[Finnucane]

For comparison, annual production of copper in Brazil is ~~250,000 tons. So it's Brazil's economic interest that that copper gets mined and used.

[marcosdumay]

> annual production of copper in Brazil is ~~250,000 tons

AKA, very small.

> So it's Brazil's economic interest that that copper gets mined and used.

No country has an interest on making cooper more expensive.

[deelowe]

All new iphones already come with a usb-c to lightening cable...

[stemlord]

They mean usb c port in the phone itself, so consumers could use virtually any usb-c cable to charge relatively safely rather than overpriced proprietary apple lightning cables or bootlegs

[cruano]

Someone should tell him that NOT firing the heads of the environmental agencies [1] of his country could make way more impact than iPhones having USB C

https://news.mongabay.com/2019/06/brazil-guts-environmental-...

[soneca]

Well, he is a judge, he can’t tell the president how to do his job. It doesn’t seem a good excuse to interfere in his judgement either way too.