Environmental Impact Mr Ross

Learning Intention: I will learn about the impact of the energy use of computer systems on the environment and how it can be reduced.

Computer Energy Use & Carbon Footprint amount of greenhouse gases produced by a particular activity greenhouse gases cause global warming computers contribute 2% of global greenhouse gases – nearly the same as the airline industry

Computer Energy Use & Carbon Footprint How do computers use energy? daily use – takes electricity to use or charge a computer system manufacture …

Manufacture Many different parts: processor, memory, motherboard, backing storage etc Lots of these parts require materials which need to be mined from all over the world. gold, silver, platinum, nickel, copper etc USA, Australia, South Africa

Energy Use Put these into order with highest user of electricity first: Laptop Gaming Desktop Printer Desktop

Energy Use for a year: Gaming Desktop 1000kWh* Desktop 166kWh** Laptop 29kWh Printer 21kWh * similar to 3 refrigerators on all the time * approx. 4 hours gaming a day ** similar to a washing machine used on average 5½ times a week

Energy Use What % manufacture v. use? DAILY USE 20%

Reducing Computer Energy Use display settings – e.g. reduce brightness enable power saving after a period of inactivity put computers into stand-by or even turn them off when not in use don’t print unnecessarily

Disposal lots of substances in computers are harmful to the environment so you should not just throw them away need to extract dangerous elements and dispose of properly but it takes energy to dispose of them in the correct manner (e.g. extracting materials like lead or mercury)

Alternatives to disposal (recycle) give the computer (or parts of it) to someone who does not have one sell it online (e.g. ebay) part-exchange it for your new one give it to the company you buy your new one from it is the manufacturers responsibility to dispose of equipment properly

WARNING What must you do to data on backing storage before you recycle it? REMOVE THE DATA Why? THINK DATA PROTECTION ACT PRINCIPLES: Security measures should prevent unauthorised access or alteration of the data

Environmental Benefits reduced travel teleconferencing online shopping telemedicine working from home reduced paper use e-mail electronic documents