The jolly bunch of tree hugging hippies over at Greenpeace has finally smoked a pipe or two and made peace with the great black turtleneck of Cupertino.

They're welcoming Apple's decision to stop using an array of truly nasty chemicals in its products. The new iPods boast Arsenic-free glass, have no brominated flame retardant, or mercury or PVC for that matter. A nice move, although there's already some 160 million old, filthy iPods in circulation. We're sure they'll all be recycled in an environmentally safe manner, i.e., sold to some unscrupulous third world waste disposal outfit.

Greenpeace claims that making small devices, such as phones or iPods without PVC and brominated flame retardants is simpler, as they generate less heat than big gadgets. Nokia, Sony Ericsson and Samsung have been using environmentally friendly materials for years, but Apple was a bit slow to catch on. We're guessing arrogance is to blame.

You can check out the Greenpeace blog here.