{"id":3266,"date":"2022-01-18T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-01-18T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/levitated.co.uk\/?p=3266"},"modified":"2022-01-18T12:46:03","modified_gmt":"2022-01-18T12:46:03","slug":"how-to-be-greener-online","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/levitated.co.uk\/how-to-be-greener-online\/","title":{"rendered":"How to be Greener online"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
What? How is this even a thing? How can your online activity negatively affect the environment? These are questions that I was certainly asking myself a week or so ago and may have also been your reaction to seeing this blog title. However, the massive spread of the internet in the previous decades has released hundreds of thousands of tonnes of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. Nevertheless, there are many small changes you could make to the online habits that can help you be greener online.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There are two main sources of greenhouse gases that you need to bear in mind. The first is the actual power that is needed to run computers, servers and other related hardware. These all rely on electricity, so whether your electricity is primarily generated by coal or wind can make a huge difference. The second source is more indirect such as the manufacturing of components as well as then shipping these components globally. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
What is referred to as the information communication and technology industry, (essentially the internet and everything attached to it) is responsible for around 2% of global emissions, at over 830 million tonnes of CO2 annually. As you will, every little action you do online requires processing power and contributes to your carbon footprint. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Before we start in earnest, I need to make clear what CO2e is. There are many different polluting gases but CO2 (Carbon Dioxide) is the most infamous. To understand global warming potential more easily, CO2e (CO2 equivalent) was created as an umbrella term used to represent pollution. Rather than breaking down pollution by different polluting gasses, CO2e represents the number of metric tonnes of other greenhouse gasses equivalent to CO2. For a more scientific understanding of CO2e, click here.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n It is estimated that an email can result in between 4gs and 50gs of CO2e. An email’s length, attachments and how many recipients it will have influence the amount of CO2e released. The average office worker’s email is responsible for an estimated equivalent to 0.6 tonnes of CO2e annually. This is equivalent to the annual per capita carbon footprint of developing Sri Lanka. The average office worker is polluting as much as the average person from Sri Lanka from their emails alone. Here are two specific positive changes you could make to your email habits right now to make them greener.<\/p>\n\n\n\n1. Green email etiquette<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n