the low down on green living
January 5th, 2008
10 Ways to Green Your Office
Many people have written to us asking for our advice on how to make an office eco-friendly. We’ve heard your pleas for help and so we have created this list of ten green office tips. Hopefully you can take some of these ideas and lead the green crusade at your office!
1. Make sure you’re recycling paper, bottles, and cans. Have separate bins in the office for recycling. If you office building does not recycle, try speaking with the office manager. Or, you can create a weekly schedule for sharing the work of taking a recycling bin home each week. (It’s sort of a pain, but this is what we do at the Low Impact Living office as our building does not recycle!)
2. Make sure you’re using compact fluorescent or LED lights throughout the office. CFs use ¼ the energy and last up to 10 times as long as standard lights. LEDs are even more energy-efficient. You can find a huge variety of lighting options right here. If your building is in charge of the lighting, talk to your building manager and make sure that they understand the money they can save from buying CF or LED lights– they may not care about the environment, but they do care about cold, hard cash!
3. Get lighting motion sensors for offices, conference rooms and bathrooms. There’s no reason for lights to be one when there’s no one in the room. Find motion sensors here.
4. Just like mom said, turn off the lights when you leave. And shut down your printers, faxes and computers. Some people are under the false impression that it’s more efficient to leave computers on over night. This is not true– shut off all the electronics when you leave the office.
5. If possible, use laptop computers rather than desktop computers. Energy Star models use up to 90% less energy. See energy-efficient laptops here.
6. Ditch the bottled water habit. Americans throw out over 35 BILLION plastic water bottles every year. Offices are major offenders in this area. Just think how many water bottles your office uses in a year! You can sign up for a water delivery service, or get a big Brita filter, and have everyone use a ceramic or glass cup. This is an easy thing to do and has a big impact!
7. On the same theme, stock your office’s kitchen with reusable ceramic plates and mugs rather than paper toss-aways.
8. Use recycled/recyclable office papers and other office products. You can get paper, envelopes, folders, pads, post-it notes– everything comes in a recycled version now. You can find many of these options at the Staples, OfficeMax and Office Depot, and you can also find them online at Green Earth Office Supply or at The Green Office.
9. Get a programmable thermostat. This device will help you keep your building warm/cool when the people there and save power and money when the people are away. Find devices here.
10. Investigate green power options. Many local utilities offer the opportunity for you to pay just a few dollars extra per month to buy “green power” that comes from wind farms and other sustainable sources. Talk to your building manager about this as an option– and you might offer to have your company pay the minimal extra fee.
Do any of you have other suggestions? We’d love to hear them. Please comment below and thank you!
Comments
alocalprinter
January 6th, 2008 at 4:12 am
Great article!
We wrote a similar one last year - there some extra ideas in it (from our perspective as an eco friendly printing company)
Tips to Green your Office
Alicia SIlva
January 16th, 2008 at 10:40 am
what about work from home when ever you can
take public transportation to go to work at least once a week
only use paper that has recycle content
try paperless approaches as much as possible
find office with south orientation so you do not need to turn on lights
reuse your binders and folders
use binders and folders from companies like rebinder that use 100% recycle content
print you business cards with green printing companies using soy based inks
only print all your marketing materials with green standards.
send email instead of mail
stasi
January 16th, 2008 at 10:57 am
Don’t recycle one-sided paper! (yet) Use the other side first, either by loading your printer with one-sided paper for casual use, or by turning it into scrap paper.
amanda.
January 16th, 2008 at 11:30 am
if your office has a tendency to get a lot of junk mail, take the extra effort to visit the company’s website and request to be unsubscribed from the mailings - this also applies to mail that is being sent to people who no longer work at the place of business!
Amanda Armstrong (Phoenix AZ)
January 17th, 2008 at 7:49 pm
If you are using paper towels in the restrooms, see if you can have a Cloth Towel Dispenser installed, or have hand towel rings installed and use fabric hand towels.
Anna Hackman
January 20th, 2008 at 5:48 pm
Use smart strips to reduce phathom loads and check out http://www.ecologicalmail.org/ which is a junk mail solution for businesses., Many past employees still get junk mail addressed to them and businesses repeating throw out these unwanted mailings. This organizations helps decrease mailings to past employees and thereby reduces a busineeses junk mail. Anna www.green-talk.com
Christine L. Delucchi
February 1st, 2008 at 12:20 am
After marketing Green projects for over 10+ years, we recently moved into our new LEED Silver office space in Washington, D.C. and are very excited to be working to reduce our company carbon footprint. Our landlord, The Tower Companies uses 100% wind energy in the building.
See our interactive tour of our space at www.delucchiplus.com/green
laura
February 14th, 2008 at 8:36 pm
10 Ways To Green Your Office……..How about sending emails to people or using email advertising? You won’t need ANY paper or envelopes if you do.
This should be your #1 tip.
Beverly D
March 5th, 2008 at 10:04 am
If your office has soda/vending machines in them, contact your vendors and ask them to take the light bulbs out of the machines…does not effect the usefulness of the machine - only the lighting up of the product name - which I’m sure is readable from the light in the office!!
Monica
March 10th, 2008 at 10:48 am
You can now get lots of office supplies that are environmentally friendly:
pencils made from scrap wood, rulers made from recycled yellow pages, biodegradeable highlighters, recyclable binders, color pencils made from managed forest wood, and lots more! Visit Green Apple School Supply www.greenapplesupply.com
KeepGreenGoing> 5 Ways to Green Your Office
March 10th, 2008 at 8:07 pm
[…] earth911.org and LowImpactLiving.com These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web […]
lindsey
March 14th, 2008 at 11:33 am
Here is another cool idea to make use of all the wasted printouts sitting around your office. Reuse them and create cool notepads.
Here is a video that shows you how.
http://www.ehow.com/video_2242954_recycled-green-notebook.html
greengrrl
March 20th, 2008 at 4:50 pm
nice idea to post the ceramic plates suggestion, but it would be more helpful to also advise that peopl should also secure the dishwashing equipment necessary to clean said ceramic plates…and what about the cost of wasting precious water?
Tips to make your office eco-friendly — The Office Master
March 26th, 2008 at 6:01 pm
[…] 10 Ways To Green Your Office at Low Impact Living […]
Mike
April 24th, 2008 at 7:28 pm
Here’s a great option, StepNpull. It’s a simple bracket that attaches to the bottom corner of any commercial latch less door and allows the user to open the door with their foot instead of their hand. There is a short demo video on the website. www.stepnpull.com
Diane Mazzarisi
April 26th, 2008 at 3:44 pm
How about trying Get Clean GERM OFF WIPES to wipe down your desk and your office phone.
Another suggestion is Basic H2 organic wipes are great to clean your computer screen.Quick and easy safe for you and the planet.
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