Tips and Tricks to Greening Your PC
Did you know that your personal computer leaves its mark on the environment due to its use of electricity that, in turn, produces coal-generated carbon emissions? And that does not include the environmental costs in their manufacture and disposal. But you might be thinking you can’t abandon the use of your pc for the sake of the environment, not when we depend on computers for making our daily tasks, and life in general, easier for us.
So how do we keep our computers and help the environment at the same time? Here’s your answer.
Green Your PC
The trick is to use your desktop or laptop in more eco-friendly ways. You can start with these green tips.
If you’re looking to buy a new computer, look for greener computer models. Start with the Electronic Products Environmental Assessment tool, which uses 28 sustainability and efficiency criteria, to evaluate the eco-friendliness of computers, to find the right green computer for you. You will find that computers are graded by awarding a gold, silver or bronze for a computer’s overall performance. Look to Dell and Hewlett Packard for inspiration.
Usually, these green computers will contain operating applications that provide users with the choice of power management settings. For example, Vista can power down if you are using your computer for typing MSWord documents and power up when you are using programs like the Adobe Photoshop.
You should also look into the Energy Star label on a personal computer. The Energy Star label was instituted by the United States Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Energy to guide buyers on the most energy-efficient home appliances. In fact, whenever you purchase new appliances, always look for the Energy Star label.
Use Wisely
If you’re not in the market for a new desktop or laptop, you can always adopt measures to lessen your environmental impact. These green tips will help:
- Make your monitor more energy efficient by not using a screen saver and lessening its brightness setting, both of which consume more energy.
- Change the sleep cycle of your computer, which is possible in more recent operating systems like Windows XP and onwards.
- Use the power management application. For example, the Macintosh and Windows-based operating systems allow users to instruct the computer to turn off the hard drive and/or go in to sleep mode after a pre-programmed amount of time.
- Use the hibernation mode on the computer, which will save you 5 watts of energy for the desktop model and 6 watts for a laptop.
Your personal computer can be your ally in saving the environment if and when you know how to use it. After all, how will you get and give more eco-friendly tips over the Web if you don’t have a computer?
The most important tip, of course, is to turn off the computer when it’s not in use. You can save tons of energy and lessen tons of carbon emissions when you adopt this green tip. Besides, it makes no sense for your computer to be on for hours at a time without someone using it. You won’t get the desired life out of it that you need to have before changing to a newer model.
