We need these virtuous circles to push through several "quantum barriers" that are holding back the widespread adoption of electronics take-back and recycling. First, the current lack of a standardized commercial infrastructure that collects products for reclamation makes any take-back effort a costly, piecemeal affair. Second, we have few, if any, pan-industry guidelines to help manufacturers design their products to be compatible with commercially viable recycling methods or green-manufacturing standards.

The good news is that the same sorts of methods used to promote widespread adoption of standards can help bootstrap the development of environmental practices and their adoption into the core of the industry business model. Whether it's common CMOS processes, Ethernet protocols, VHDL languages or the recent explosion of 802.11 WLAN products, each successful technology has relied on a framework of guidelines that make interoperability and development of common tool sets practical.

In both formal standards efforts, supported by the likes of the IEEE and the ITU, and less-formal industry initiatives, the widespread adoption of environmental practices enables a virtuous circle to form. Widespread adoption creates economies of scale that drive down the cost to produce each successive generation of products. This, in turn, leads to greater demand that fuels successive waves of innovation.

So, what will it take to make green tech an accepted part of our industry? Rather than wait for the government or a formal standards-making group to impose its will, members of a pro-active, pan-industry initiative must begin to define the best practices needed to design, produce, collect and recycle their products in an environmentally responsible and cost-effective manner. Much like any successful technology or standard, it will require a two-pronged approach.

First, it's up to the pioneers in the field to outline some long-term goals and pool their expertise to develop a set of best practices and industry guidelines that can be openly shared and adopted. Meanwhile, the IEEE, ITU and other organizations can support the translation of these best practices and initiatives into formal standards and requirements. Meanwhile, all participants can help develop the educational materials for use in colleges, professional certification and continuing education programs to help speed the day we start seeing products that never see a landfill or incinerator.

Actually, I'm already starting to see the glimmers of virtuous circles forming. When things are a bit further along, you'll be able to read about it in this column.