Interoffice Memo: Greenify Thy Workspace
It’s where you spend half your day and it needs your help. So here are some tips for Acmefying your workspace:
Put those lights out!
During the Blitz they knew to douse the lights. (Oh the good old days.) Think of climate change as the new Stuka dive bomber. It’s amazing how much energy is wasted by leaving lights on in meeting rooms, staff areas, kitchens and closets that are not being used. Print out one of our special Acme stickers [link to this page] and place it under light switches at work. And light often provides as much light as you need. As long as it isn’t raining.
Install light sensors
And why not talk to your boss about installing occupancy sensors? They automatically detect when areas are not in use and switch off the lights automatically. You may have seen one in an early James Bond film (but it was probably connected to a light laser that got turned on instead of off.)
Switch it off
Don’t just standby -- at the end of the day switch off your computer completely. That means no little red lights blinking at you. These are the little red blinking lights of shame. (Okay some of them are green.) Computers and monitors account for half the electricity wasted in an office every day. Research suggests that if you turned your PC fully off overnight and at weekends, you’d save £63 a year. For an office of 50 computers, that's over £3100. You could buy another five computers. Just make sure they’re made of biodegradable materials. And switch those off too.
Use recycled thy products
Stationery is an easy one – start your office with a new blank page, making sure your printer paper is made up at least 60 percent recycled material. While you’re at it (are you at it?), check your envelopes and letterheads as well as folders, files and other filing products. Take a gander at your bathroom and kitchen purchases like toilet rolls and paper towels. Are they made from recycled materials? Does the office fridge have organic milk? Does the tea towel have a nice picture of a monkey on it?
Recycle thy paper
And your drink bottle, cans and cartons. That’s what the marked bins are for – and make sure no one’s tossing in the used coffee filters (you could put those in the office compost heap, behind the IT department). And why are you printing out your emails and memos anyway? Remember: every time you print out an email, a penguin gets killed. It’s true.
Recycle or donate thy old office equipment
Don’t chuck out your old PCs and mimeograph machine. (Actually, if you still have a mimeograph machine you should probably send it to the Science Museum.) Britain’s businesses are responsible for generating 77 million tonnes of waste every year. With a little effort, around half of this could be recycled rather than sent to landfill. You can donate your old office equipment by contacting HYPERLINK "http://www.itforcharities.co.uk/pcs.htm" www.itforcharities.co.uk/pcs.htm. They have a list of several charities that will be happy to take your old iBook. You probably never liked the colour anyway.
Get thee an energy audit
Why not give your office an energy audit? It’ll be telling it that you care. Also, that you want to see where your company could improve its energy efficiency and contribute to the decrease in CO2 emissions produced by British businesses. Check www.tvenergy.org/links.htm for links to various related websites.