eco-officiency blog » Green Business

Save Money and CO2: Employ Flexible Schedules – Work from Home Programs

eco-officiency — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 05:00:59 +0000

More and more companies are implementing flexible schedules, allowing employees to work 4/10s (four ten hour days), 9/80s (9 hours days with one day off every two weeks), or to work from home. These flex schedules don’t just boost employee morale, they are also good for the environment. By driving two days less day per week, the average person can save about 143 gallons of gasoline and keep about 2,778 pounds of CO2 out of the atmosphere in a year. If only 1 percent of all licensed drivers followed suit, 273 million gallons of gasoline and 5.3 billion pounds of CO2 could be saved this year.

If you aren’t sure how to implement a telework program or are concerned about productivity, consider using e-work. e-work provides online training and consulting geared to telework and virtual work programs.

Save Money – Turn Computers off at Night

eco-officiency — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 05:00:35 +0000

More than 31 million of the country’s 104 million office computers are left on overnight. According to the campaign survey “across the nation, this adds up to more than $1.72 billion dollars and almost 15 million tons of CO2 emissions.”

It is a cost per employee of about $150 per year to power a computer overnight…essentially that is not being used. Implement an office campaign to turn computers off at night. Having trouble remembering? Set Outlook to send you a reminder every day 15 minutes before you typically leave.

Or entice your IT department to purchase an IT system that will do it for you such as Verdiem Software. This software allows for power management settings to be controlled by a central server system. Essentially it can turn off all computers in an organization at the same time.

Meeting Prep – Don’t Print that Document

eco-officiency — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 05:00:55 +0000

A study by Xerox showed that 45% of the office paper that is discarded was on the day it was printed – which begs the question, how necessary was it to print the document in the first place?

Next time you go to a meeting, consider whether everyone really needs a full copy of all the documents. If it is just an aid to be used during the meeting and then discarded, don’t print it. Not only does this waste paper, but often people will end up reading, or skimming, the document rather than listen to you talk. However, your audience still needs to be informed, so here are some alternatives to printing a copy for each person.

Print one or two master copies that can be passed around.
Develop a 1 page executive summary that highlights the main points
E-mail the information out beforehand so people can be familiar with the information
Use an overhead projector or white board to write up the main points or topics
Download to a e-reader such as a Kindle or iPad

McDonald’s Best Practises

eco-officiency — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 05:00:29 +0000

Although McDonald’s is not known for its healthiest menu, it has done a terrific job of incorporating sustainable business practices into its organization.McDonald’s has a specific webpage designed to share their best green practices for other companies and organizations to learn from. Bob Langert, the Chief Corporate Sustainability Officer for McDonalds, also has a terrific blog. He travels around the world working to support sustainable food supply.

ShareGreen: Green Business Best Practises

eco-officiency — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 06:00:54 +0000

Walmart Canada recently launched a website, ShareGreen, that offers case studies on green business best practices within Canada.

Case studies have already been posted from companies such as Nestle Water, Stonyfield Farms, Tetra Pak, SC Johnson and Kimblerly-Clark. All companies are encouraged to share their stories and case studies on how they have improved energy, waste, green products and solution, and employee engagement.

Case studies are organized by industry sector such as food and beverage, manufacturing, professional services, resource extraction and retail industries, with plans to add further industries for the government, tourism and transportation sectors.

Take a look and see what other companies are doing to be more green and eco-conscious in their business.

Consider Purchasing Carbon Offsets for Work Travel

eco-officiency — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 05:00:58 +0000

Starting to wonder how much impact all that work travel is having? The average American commutes 20 miles a day, that’s about 5,000 miles a year, resulting in just over 2 tons of CO2.
Consider purchasing carbon offsets to counteract the carbon dioxide emissions of driving or flying home to meetings and conferences. A carbon offset for the entire year’s worth of commuting emissions could cost as little as $45. According to the Colorado Carbon Fund, a Carbon Offset means “neutralize,” “balance,” or “cancel out.” Carbon offsets counteract these activities by funding projects to compensate for CO2 emissions occurring at another source. These offsets help fund projects that reduce the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

Though there are many organizations that offer Carbon Offsets, the Colorado Carbon Fund and Aspen’s Canary Tags are two great providers that use the proceeds for projects in Colorado.

For more ideas on how to reduce environmental impact with business travel, see the article entitled What you Must Know about Flying Green by Patti Prairie CEO of Brighter Planet.

Green Office Cleaning

eco-officiency — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 23:32:45 +0000

Most offices have a janitorial or custodial vendor who cleans offices. It is important to have your vendors support your organizations sustainability program.To encourage ‘green’ cleaning ask your vendor for the following;

Use green cleaning supplies. Make sure cleaning supplies are non-toxic and eco-friendly. Seventh Generation and All Green have a great line of cleaning products.
Turn off lights. Ask your janitorial staff to turn off all lights upon leaving the building. This supports accountability with this simple energy saving action.
Provide recycling and waste data. In order to improve recycling and waste management it is important to get data from your janitorial staff on the usage of receptacles along with rate of recycling. Make sure your janitorial staff is managing waste responsibly.

Update Your Fax and Save Paper

eco-officiency — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 05:00:02 +0000

E-mail and scanners have all but made the fax machine a thing of the past, but most offices can’t quite give them up yet. The good news is there are now Online Faxes that allow you all the convenience of a fax machine, but use less paper, and offer other benefits:

Lower Cost
More Efficient Use of Time
More Reliable
Environmentally Responsible
Security

How it works:

Sending: When sending faxes, you log in to the fax website and upload the document. If the document is already a file on your hard drive, you simply upload it like an e-mail attachment. If you only have a hard copy, you’ll need to scan it, save it, then upload it. On the receiving end, the recipient will get a paper hard copy, just like you had sent it via traditional fax (unless they too have an online fax).

Receiving: When receiving incoming faxes, rather than a paper print out, you get an e-mail with an attachment. If you need to print it you can, otherwise you can just save it to the appropriate folder on your hard drive.

All those unwanted faxes, just hit delete – no need to save them to your desktop, waste paper. Need another reason? Most spam fax comes through whether you want it to or not, that means it gets printed, and you have to pay for the paper.

Get Festive with LED Holiday Lights

eco-officiency — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 17:08:05 +0000

As the holiday season approaches you may want to add some decorations around the office, as well as at home. One easy way to spread the holiday cheer while saving energy, and some company money, is to switch to LED (light emitting diode) holiday lights. LED lights are an alternative to conventional incandescent holiday lights and are gaining popularity and availability. Though still more expensive than conventional lights, LEDs offer a number of benefits that not only outweigh the cost, but actually may make them cheaper in the long run. Some stores are offering a take back program, where they will take your old holiday lights, recycle them, and give you a discount on new LED lights.

Benefits of LED lights:

90% more energy efficient – saving you money on the utility bill
When one bulb goes out, the others stay lit
Unlike incandescent bulbs, LEDs are cool to the touch
LEDs are more durable and less likely to break
Pricewise, LEDs cost about five times as much as incandescents upfront. But their life span is 50,000 hours, instead of 1,000-2,000 hours for incandescents. That means if you lit the LEDs for 45 days each year, 24 hours a day, it would take 46 years for them to dim.

For more information visit this site on Holiday Lights:

Sign the Copenhagan Communique on Climate Change

eco-officiency — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 18:13:34 +0000

Today, business leaders have a chance to get their voice heard on climate change. The University of Cambridge is compiling a list of world business leaders that will sign a statement that will lead to aggressive changes on climate change globally. Business leaders from the Corporate Leaders’ Group will be handing a copy of The Copenhagen Communiqué to the Prime Minister Gordon Brown on December 10, 2009 which will be passed onto the leaders at the United Nations Copenhagen Climate Change Conference.

For more information on climate change visit these websites:

Carbon Disclosure Project

Climate Wire

Climate Ark

Extreme Ice Survey