Katie Fehrenbacher | posted on January 7, 2009
The annual Consumer Electronics Show (CES)— at which every new gadget debuting in the year ahead is trotted out for display in a football-sized stadium in Las Vegas — is upon us again. After spending days walking amidst rows of 82-inch flat screen TVs and pocketing useless tchotkes from hundreds of vendors at the show, you couldn’t imagine a more perfect event to embody the ultimate in consumerism and waste. But in 2008, CES introduced a “green” component, showcasing lower-power gadgets, solar-powered devices and recycled goods, in an attempt to make the show a little more palatable to the environmentally inclined. And in 2009, the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA), the trade group behind CES, is expanding that green aspect even further, trying to adjust to both increasingly eco-friendly attitudes and leaner economic times.
“CES is going greener this year,” says Jill Fehrenbacher, creator of theGreener Gadgets conference, which CEA purchased last year for an undisclosed amount. (Disclosure: she’s also my sister, and I organized a panel at the first Greener Gadgets). CES is folding “Greener Gadgets” content into the show in various places, including a panel on Jan. 10 that will feature Mary Lou Jepsen, CEO of Pixel Qi and founder and former CTO of the One Laptop Per Child project; and Jeff Omelchuck, the executive director of the Green Electronics Council. …read full discussion







