Mommy Goes Green

When you aren’t actively using your computer, what does it do?  Stay on?  Hibernate?  At the end of the day, do you shut down or just log off?

With one simple change, Ford Motor is saving over $1 million annually – just by managing the power settings on company laptops and desktop systems.  It also reduced its carbon footprint by an estimated 16,000 to 25,000 metric tons annually.

You can make this simple change at home or at the office to have an impact on your energy use.

• Enable power management settings on computers and monitors so they go into “sleep mode” when away or not in use. At the minimum, set computers to enter system standby or hibernate after 30 to 60 minutes of inactivity. To save even more, set monitors to enter sleep mode after 5 to 20 minutes of inactivity. The lower the setting, the more energy you save.  On laptops, be sure to activate these settings in the AC power profile — not just the DC (battery power) profile.
• At the end of the day make sure to unplug your desktop or laptop – else, it will draw phantom power.

Additional ways to lower your computer’s energy consumption:

• Choose a laptop – laptop computers ( 15-45 watts ) use a fraction of energy compared to desktop ( 60-250 watts )
• Choose a LCD monitor – LCD monitors ( 35 watts ) use less energy than CRT monitors ( 80 watts )
• Purchase Energy Star qualified monitors and computers
• Plug all your computer peripherals into a Smartstrip so when your computer gets turned off – so do the peripherals.  Again – saving phantom power draws.

Curious how much energy you are using?  Wonder what tips would save you even energy (and money)?  Download Edison, a free energy monitoring software application.

Companies are always looking to set themselves apart and define themselves uniquely.  If your company wants to convey their eco-friendly intentions, walk the walk with eco-friendly promotional products. 

Botanical Paperworks provides promotional paper products all printed on 100% tree-free, plantable paper.  No trees AND they grow into wildflowers once planted!  Their promo products include coasters, postcards, business cards and coasters.

Ecobranders has thousands of traditional promotional products like water bottles, lanyards, t-shirts and pens but all with an eco-friendly twist.  The key holder is powered by solar, the pens are recyclable, and the golf balls are made from renewable materials.

Every company has a reusable tote bag so change things up and give your clients a custom reusable wine tote (with a bottle of your favorite wine, of course!).  Factory Direct Promos will print them for you for as low as 59 cents!

A couple months ago, I was given a copy of GreenPrint, FREE software that eliminates unwanted pages saving paper, ink, money, and millions of trees.  It does this by analyzing each page of every document sent to the printer and looking for typical waste characteristics (like that last page with just a URL, banner ad, logo, or legal jargon). I’ve been using it at home and love it! It was so easy to install and works every time you go to print ( you can disable it if necessary ).

GreenPrint also incorporates an easy to use PDF writer, a print preview called GreenView, and a reporting feature which keeps track of the number of pages and the amount of money you have saved – we could all use a little saved money!

It’s FREE for Windows 2000/XP/Vista users.  MAC users can use the program for free for 30 days ( $29 to purchase ).

Encourage your employer to implement GreenPrint Enterprise edition.  With 25 employees, GreenPrint estimates one office would save over $2200 per year and over 35,000 pieces of paper – with one little piece of software!