The environment may not seem like an electrical engineer's place. However many things electrical engineers do have great effects on the environment. Electrical engineers do work on power plants that use cleaner energy sources but many products from electrical engineers require large amounts of resources. There is a conflict between producing technology at the sacrifice of some extra resources and lessening production to spare resources. Many of today's electronics have become vital to daily life. There is definitely a need for electrical engineers to produce things faster and better. Electrical circuits during production need to be kept from any sort of impurities. Gallons of water are used to wash chemicals off which contaminates the water. This is one example of production at the cost of resources. These processes do meet federal standards and are very important. Its up to electrical engineers to put in extra effort to make these processes better than the bare minimum.
Solar panels are one of electrical engineering's most resource-efficient energy producers.
On the side of leaning more environmentally-friendly, many of electrical engineering's products use valuable resources. If there is a more resource-efficient way to produce that is also more expensive then so be it. The standards set are just enough to reduce waste and allow production to be high. By being more environmentally aware electrical engineers can make a positive impact on the world while they perform their jobs. Striving to be more efficient will better processes in the long run. By minimizing waste electrical engineers conserve resources for future use and allow themselves more freedom in production.
On the better and faster production side, electrical engineer's products have become absolutely necessary to today's world. There is a high demand for the best electronics which means resources have to be used. Processes such as making circuits are designed to be efficient already and the use of large amounts of energy and resources is required to make these products. Electrical engineers can produce great amounts of energy and better electronics at the cost of great amounts of resources. The things electrical engineers create have very important uses while the purpose of resources is to create these things.
I believe the correct and ethical course of action is to lean more environmentally friendly. The production of electronics is very important however the effects it has on the environment cannot be ignored. I believe many electrical engineers strive for this but there is always the option to meet the minimum standards and focus only on production. A major focus in electrical engineering is energy production so I believe it is important to hold environmentally-friendly processes in high regard.
