Greening your workplace can reduce your office’s environmental impact, provide a healthier, more productive work environment, and can even positively impact your bottom line. Whether you’re the CEO or still climbing the corporate ladder, a business’s entire staff must do their part to help reduce an office’s carbon footprint. One way to unify your team’s efforts to go green is to address the inefficiencies in your print fleet.
Implementing the following printing rules can help keep your business’s environmental impact in check.
Default to Duplex – Setting every printer in your fleet to duplex (double-sided) printing packs a significant punch against your office’s carbon footprint, and reduces paper usage by as much as 50 percent. If required, single-sided printing can be accommodated by setting predetermined rules that override the duplex setting.
Consolidate Your Machines – Instead of having an individual scanner, fax machine, copier, and printer, an easy way to green your print fleet is to consolidate your efforts with one or more multifunction printers (MFPs). By switching to an MFP, you’ll not only decrease your carbon footprint, but you’ll also use less energy and fewer supplies, decrease your overhead investment, free up office space, and increase employee proficiency.
Limit the Use of Color – Default all printers to automatically print in black and white, rather than color. Set printers to require users to meet certain requirements or conditions for when documents absolutely need to be printed in color, like for marketing materials or important presentations.
Set Pop-up Warnings – Most modern printers will allow for pop-up warnings to alert users of printing rules and the environmental impact of their printing choices when attempting to print. Rather than printing indiscriminately, pop-up warnings will remind users to think twice before printing certain documents, like emails or website pages.
Digitize, Whenever Possible – Providing digital copies of documents is a much greener practice than printing hardcopy handouts. When filed and indexed correctly, having digital copies increases your chances of locating documents in the future, rather than having to reprint or—even worse—reproduce them. Document management software can significantly help with your efforts to digitize and meaningfully store your business data.
Double Down on Recycling – Does your office already recycle its paper products and printing consumables? If not, start now! Moreover, look for recycled or certified sustainable paper to print on, and recycle all toner and ink cartridges to boost the impact of your recycling efforts.
Contact us today to learn about more ways to reduce your office’s carbon footprint.