Greener office equipment

A group called the Green Electronics Council recently released a report on progress in making equipment, mostly PCs and monitors, less harmful to the environment. The report measures the sale of products rated highly by a system called EPEAT (Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool).

EPEAT was developed by the EPA. This system rates a growing number of products as gold, silver, and bronze in terms of their recyclability, reduced use of toxic materials, and lowered power use. All US Federal computer buys now must be of EPEAT-certified products.

EPEAT-certified PCs and laptops make up 22% of all computers worldwide. Since its inception in 2006, there has been a 150% growth in sales of certified computers. Prospects are good that the numbers will keep going up as companies and individuals become more aware of the environmental costs of disposing old office machines.

Among the benefits of using EPEAT products are:
* Reducing use of primary materials by 75.5 million metric tons
* Reducing use of toxic materials (especially lead) by 3,220 metric tons
* Making significant reductions in mercury use
* Reducing disposal of hazardous waste by 124,000 metric tons
* Saving over 42 billion kilowatt hours of electricity.

Paperless or at least less paper

BusinessWeek recently reported (“The New Push to Get Rid of Paper,” 5/30/08) on a renewed effort to approach the long-wished for “paperless office,” noting that the term is now 33 years old.

Of course offices are anything but paperless. As the article notes:“According to RISI, a research firm that tracks forest products, in 1975 the average U.S. office worker used 62 pounds of paper a year. By 1999, that figure peaked at 143 pounds, but in 2006 it was still at 127 pounds.”.

But things may be changing, thanks to a public that is getting more used to receiving and viewing things on the screen. The article cites PNC Bank, 15% of whose customers now get PDF files rather than paper for account statements, up from 0% a few years ago. 80% of company internal reports are now published electronically, not on paper.

Among the interesting points cited in the report:
* One analyst “estimates that companies will spend about $8 billion this year on paper alone.”
* One company thought it “had 150 fax machines, but a detailed search turned up 1,000, many of which were rarely used.”
* “Researchers at Xerox found that about half of the documents printed in a typical office are thrown away within 24 hours.”

Turning it off

HP's UK branch has released a short online publication called “The HP Guide for Greener Printing” available here online.

Most of the advice is pretty obvious, with encouragement to print in duplex, send more documents electronically, and recycle paper.

On interesting point is made, however, about the effect of letting printers and copiers run when not in use. “All office equipment uses energy when switched on or in stand-by mode. In the UK alone, equipment left on standby is responsible for generating over 3 million tonnes of CO2 each year, according to the Energy Saving Trust.”

Of course, many copiers and some printers have sleep modes that are automatically triggered if left idle for a preset period (generally somewhere between five and 60 minutes) , or can be set to go off ready automatically during non-working hours. That’s part of the new EnergyStar criteria for newer machines, and many companies are complying. But many older desktop machines in particular do not offer any sleep feature. Having employees shut down desktop printers and MFPs at the end of the day may be a smart idea.

Xerox Green Survey

In time for Earth Day, a recent survey by Xerox asked US office workers about the "non-green” practices in their offices. According to Xerox, the biggest gripes about companies’ lack of environmental awareness were::

* mindless printing resulting in abandoned pages at the printer (40 percent)
* leaving lights on in unused offices (37 percent)
* lack of recycling bins (33 percent)
* excessive air conditioning or heating (29 percent)
* wasteful use of paper products, such as plates and cups (27 percent)
* co-workers who don't recycle (27 percent)
* co-workers who print single-sided instead of double-sided documents (24 percent).

The survey also noted that environmental awareness is often a function of age, where younger employees tend to be more green-oriented. It also noted that women tend to be more eco-conscious than men.

It’s interesting that many of these issues have to do with printing, an area where users themselves have some control over the waste.

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Used toner cartridge? Sit on it

Here’s a creative new use for those spent toner and ink jet cartridges. It’s true that some vendors have a cartridge return program where they can re-use or recycle them, but many do not. It’s especially bad on the off-brand toner and ink market. What’s an eco-conscientious user to do?

Now a UK recycling company called Waycam has a new idea – they use a process that transforms cartridges into a plastic called TRI Wood, and then turn it into fence posts and garden furniture.

While the furniture aspect is a great stunt, the serious issue, as they acknowledge, is recycling the (highly toxic) used toner. It’s another step in the effort to keep more toxins out of landfills. This kind of thing is becoming increasingly a legal necessity in Europe, and it is something that should spread in the near future to the US.

Paper Mountains

A recent survey in the UK indicates that office workers print out “a paper mountain more than eight miles high every year.” The survey, commissioned by Fujitsu and Siemens, concluded that half of the pages printed in a typical office went unread.

According to a story in London newspaper The Telegraph (“UK offices 'print paper mountains', 10/15/07), the average office worker has grown used to “carefree printing habits.” Half of the workers surveyed admitted that they had printed out the same pages more than once by mistake.

According to the Telegraph story “Two in five workers (43 per cent) said they had picked up someone else's print-out by mistake and 8 per cent admitted to printing emails before they had read them.”

In other interesting results from the survey:
▪ Three out of four workers says that they have fixed paper jams themselves.
▪ Two thirds say that they have changed toner.
▪ A quarter said that they had walked away from an out of order printer, letting someone else fix it. (I’m sure someone is lying here)
▪ 17 percent admitted they just threw printed pieces away with no thought of recycling.
▪ Two-thirds of UK firms provided paper recycling bins, and almost half had ways for recycling confidential materials.

These are figures for the UK, but the US results are probably no different and may even be worse. If the UK has paper mountains, the US has Himalayas. And since the survey was based on self-reporting, you can be sure that the numbers look better than they really are.

Not surprisingly, two-thirds of all companies had no policies setting guidelines for what should be printed. It’s not simply a matter of “saving trees,” though that is important. It’s the enormous expense that unneeded printing costs in both paper and toner, and wear and tear on equipment. As has often been pointed out, printing and copying costs are one of the least controlled areas of office expense, and few companies have even a clear idea of what they are paying for it.

Health and laser printers

A recent Australian study of office air quality raised some concerns about laser printers, more specifically the toner particles emitted by them. This so-called “ultra-fine particle pollution” can contribute to respiratory illnesses, much like having secondhand smoke from a nearby indoor smoker, something no office these days permits. As one of the scientist from Queensland University is quoted as saying “If a printer operates in an indoor environment, the concentration of ultra-fine particles would be of the same order of magnitude as if there was secondhand smoke in a similar environment.”

The curious thing is that some laser printers emit no or little toner, while others emit a high level. And even printers from the same vendor can range from totally clean to polluting. While all printers pass federal safety and health regulations, the Australian study points out a new area for concern.

The Australian group is still continuing its studies (they have found, for example, that copiers are generally less of a problem), and they may well discover why some printers emit give off more particles than others. There may be a manufacturing fix that can lower the particle count on the worst offending machines.

In a practical sense, offices should become more aware of general ventilation and air exchange, something that would be useful in general, for cutting down on colds and other air-borne viruses.