Fifty percent of employed adults in the U.S. don’t typically shut down their computers at the end of the work day.

By Mark Mathson

“Turn out the lights when you leave the room.”

“Consider the environment and don’t print a document unless you really need to.”

“If you must print, be sure to use both sides of the paper.”

We’ve all heard these types of environmentally friendly statements before, and by now I think we all see how adhering to these tips can make an impact – on the environment, our company’s expenses and our own personal expenses. While it seems fairly obvious that turning off the lights when leaving a room for more than 15 minutes will save on energy costs and duplex printing will save on paper costs, there are a number of other steps you can take – which might not be quite so obvious – that can add up to some big savings to the bottom line.

Take a look under your desk. If yours is anything like mine, you’ll see a variety of power cords plugged into a surge protector, including cords for the computer, monitor, and Blackberry charger. These devices can be wasting energy (and dollars) every day, even when they are not in use.

Heading to that Meeting

When you’re headed off to a meeting, one very easy way to save energy is to ensure that you set the sleep functionality on your computer. This can be easily done on a Windows machine by selecting:

1. Start Menu
2. Control Panel
3. System and Maintenance
4. Power Options

Here, you’ll be able to set all of your power settings, including the amount of time your computer is inactive before it will go into standby (or sleep) mode. You can also select a feature on this menu allowing your monitor to automatically turn off as well.

And be careful using screen savers! According to recent studies, a screensaver showing images, colors or movement can actually use more energy than normal. You’ll save more energy if the screen goes completely dark… and if you turn your monitor off when you leave, you’ll save even more.

Leaving for the Night

According to the 2009 PC Energy Report, 50 percent of employed adults in the U.S. who use a PC at work don’t typically shut down their computers at the end of the work day. Collectively, U.S. organizations waste approximately $2.8 billion every year powering 108 million unused computers. In 2009, these unused computers were expected to emit approximately 20 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions – roughly equivalent to the impact of 4 million cars. So for an organization with 2,000 employees (Buck Consultants’ size), this can add up to about $50,000 per year in extra utility expenses. And that’s just for the computers!

While some of us have laptops that we take home with us, there are too many computers running all night long. Be sure to power down your computer when you leave the office at night. Turning off the power at the surge protector will save even more energy as some equipment still uses a small amount of energy when switched off.

Take a Look Around

Look over your office and determine what is using more energy than it needs to. Some are more obvious than others. What really needs to be on or charging when you’re not there? Can you change it to an energy-saving setting? Or turn it off completely when leaving for the night or an extended period of time? Each of us taking small steps to waste less energy will go a long way to helping the environment and also controlling our expenses. Both of which are a good thing!

Tags: Computers, Energy, Office, Power savings

Friday, February 12th, 2010 | Business, Energy, Environmental |