Businesses of all sizes can play an active role in helping prevent climate change by lowering the amount of carbon emissions they produce. From encouraging car-sharing and the use of public transport to implementing recycling schemes and turning off lights, there are many things we can do as a nation to reduce our impact on the planet.
This article discusses five easy ways to reduce your carbon footprint without ditching your office printer.
Use an Energy-Efficient Device
Energy-saving printers consume less energy during operation than traditional printers thanks to power-saving features such as sleep mode, power management, and quick start.
These printers help reduce electricity bills and contribute to sustainability efforts by lowering the carbon footprint associated with printing operations.
Send Your Printer to Sleep
Did you know your printer still uses electricity, even when you’re not using it? Your office printer still consumes energy during office hours and even overnight when it doesn’t need to be.
Activating sleep mode is a great way to reduce your printer’s power consumption. By adjusting your printer’s settings, you can tell it to put itself to sleep overnight. If you’re using an older printer without a sleep mode function, you can turn your printer off manually before leaving the office.
Over time, all this saved energy will add up, reducing your carbon footprint and electricity bill.
Recycle Your Toner Cartridges
Did you know that a single toner cartridge can be recycled and reused up to six times before it reaches the end of its life? As a nation, we use more than 45 million toner cartridges yearly, yet only 15% are recycled or reused.
Recycling your empty toner cartridges means they can be re-manufactured and reused again and again – reducing your environmental impact.
At Control Print Solutions, we encourage our customers to recycle their used toner cartridges by offering a recycling scheme. This means that our customers can save their used toner cartridges, have them collected, and they can be recycled and reused up to six times before going to landfill.
Adjust Your Print Settings
Making small changes to how you print documents is both environmentally friendly and cost-effective. Here are several changes you can implement to reduce waste when printing:
- Encourage dual-sided printing for draft documents.
- Before printing a document, use the print preview feature to ensure you only print what you need.
- Before recycling used paper, consider using the backside for drafts.
- Use digital tools like Grammarly to proofread documents before printing them to avoid reprints due to errors.
- Use ink-saving fonts such as Century Gothic, Times New Roman, Calibri, and Arial.
- Experiment with smaller font sizes and margins.
By implementing these changes and adopting a more conscious approach to printing, you can significantly reduce waste and your carbon footprint without cutting your output.
Use Monitoring and Reporting Software
Printer monitoring software is designed to track, manage, and optimise the use of printers and printing resources within a business. Print monitoring software can help control costs and reduce unnecessary waste by offering detailed insights into printing activities.
Our Print Management Software allows you to track printing by user, device and department to help you understand and manage your output, eliminate waste and cut costs.
By reducing your business’s carbon footprint, you could positively contribute to lowering the impact of climate change.
Interested to learn more about our energy-saving devices and cost-cutting Print Management Software? Speak to our team.