Apple

Smart phone rivals Apple and Samsung now share a rather ignominious position after having both been slammed on child exploitation and environmental pollution charges by environmental group Friends of the Earth (FoE).

The Indonesian island of Bangka is being ravaged by tin mining which rivals Samsung and Apple use in their smartphones, says a new report from Friends of the Earth (FoE). Called Mining for Smartphones: the True Cost of Tin, the report says that tin mining has created a litany of environmental and social problems, including damaging more than 65 percent of Bangka's forest and over 70 percent of its coral reefs. Fifteen rivers are now contaminated by tin mining waste and access to clean water has become a problem for more than half of the island's population.

The global electric vehicle market and rechargeable battery sector could be in for supply shock, according to a US mining company and has benefited a Mongolian company.

Greenpeace's has just released its 2012 Cool IT Leaderboard, with Google taking the top spot in the ranking technology firms' environmental efforts, seizing the crown from networking giant Cisco.

Apple has published its 2012 Supplier Responsibility Progress Report which, for the first time, contains a list of 156 suppliers that represent 97 percent of its procurement expenditures for materials, manufacturing, and assembly in 2011. The company has also announced that it will allow an independent third party – a non-profit called the Fair Labor Association (FLA) – to check on working conditions at those factories, and to make its findings public. The FLA already checks on suppliers for other American companies, including Nike, New Balance, and Adidas but Apple is the first technology company on its roster.