What do you think is the impact of printing our information books?
Positive:
-Good feedback will move us improve as authors
-Sense of accomplishment
-Sharing useful information
-We could save lives
-Share our learning with others
Negative:
-Uses paper which causes trees to get cut down
--> Animal habitats may be destroyed
-Uses energy: computers, printer --> energy comes from burning coal, water dams
-Uses ink: color uses up more ink than we need
Other thoughts:
-Gifs need to be screenshot-ed
We need to be aware of the negative impacts and try to lessen them.
You ever stop to think about the impact you make on the environment when you hit the print button? Most folks focus on the amount of paper used in printing, but few stop to think about what goes into the ink and toner cartridges in their printer.
To find out, I’ve researched the environmental impact of printing and what I’ve found is quite shocking. Here are some facts about the shadier side of ink and toner:
- Each year, more than 350 million ink and toner cartridges are thrown out in the United States alone (and this number increases every year!)
- Ink cartridges in landfills can take up to a millennium to decompose, as they contain resin
- Toner cartridges contain toxic ingredients such as volatile organic compounds in the form of solvents
- It takes almost a gallon of oil to make a single laser ink cartridge
- Manufacturing a single toner cartridge releases 4.8 Kilograms of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere
What can we do?
1) Minimize the amount of color in our books
- backgrounds need to be white, text needs to be black
2) Minimize the amount of printing
- two-sided
- ask myself do I really need to print this?
3) Choose not to print, create a PDF and post to our blogs
4) Eliminate unnecessary slides
