Choosing a ‘green’ laptop

We all need to play our part in moving towards a ‘greener’, more sustainable lifestyle. This covers every part of our daily lives, including work. I’m in the market for a new laptop, so I’ve decided to try to go green and I’ve been researching my options.

I’m not a computer expert but I am technically minded, so I’ve been hunting down information that strikes a balance between the two. I thought I’d share these with you, in case they can help you too.

What I’m looking for

Firstly, my considerations:

I have a limited budget (as far as laptops go) but realise I might have to pay a bit more to meet the environmental standards I’d like (which, by the way, I’ve only identified by reading the following articles – my initial standard was, well, ‘better’).
The majority of my clients are corporate and are therefore using Windows. My new laptop needs to be compatible with the technology my clients use.
I don’t just want the ‘green’ offering from a company that’s targeting that area of the customer market. It’s no good if it otherwise falls down on its other products, or fails to be a ‘good corporate citizen’.
(Yes, it falls in with ‘corporate social responsibility’, which I know lots of people are sceptical about. But customer demand drives business strategy, and if this is towards a more community-focused one, then that’s a good thing in my mind.)

Sources of information

I don’t think these are too much to ask of a modern organisation. So, on to the sources I’ve been using to help me make my choice:

The Greenpeace Green Electronics Survey, December 2008 (PDF) (this was my starting point, which suggests Apple and Toshiba should be considered)
‘Does Apple really have the greenest notebooks?‘, InfoWorld
‘Are green IT premiums worth the cost?‘, InfoWorld
The Green Electronics Council’s EPEAT website, which provides searchable criteria to help businesses choose electronic products ‘based on their environmental attributes’.

Trusting what I read

I’m not going to pretend that this is a particularly scientific piece of research, but I’m simply doing my best to make a decision based on the information available to me. I think this is how many members of the public would try to make their choice, and they’re the ones who will be buying much of the technology.

Do you know of any good articles or have any words of wisdom to share that will help me to make the right choice (for now)? If so, please share them below. Otherwise, stay posted – I’ll let you know which I decide on and my reasons why.

Posted: September 15th, 2009 | Author: admin | Filed under: Green computing | Tags: apple, Green computing, green IT, greenpeace, laptops, research, toshiba | No Comments »

‘Green computing’: not an oxymoron

I’m conscious about the footprint I leave on the environment and am always interested in ways to reduce it further. This applies to both my everyday life and my work (I use a green web host). As a freelancer who works mostly from home, I don’t have to worry about a carbon-emitting trip to and from an office. However, due to this and the fact I write copy for websites, I rely on having my computer on nearly all day, every day.

So, I was interested to read Leo Hickman’s article, ‘How green is your computer?’. It provides some interesting background to the efforts that computing giants such as Google and Intel are making to reduce the effects of computing on the environment. The article leads in with some research on the carbon generated every time someone runs a Google search. While the results appear to be in dispute currently, they do make you think. I don’t know about you, but I often find it all too easy to just sit at my (small, clean, quiet) laptop without really thinking about what’s powering it.

I joined up to the Clean Energy Project some weeks ago (you may have seen the Tweet if you follow me on Twitter). This project harnesses the power of idle computers around the world to carry out calculations that will help to identify organic molecules for efficient solar cells. By sharing this task and using computers that are already on, emissions are reduced significantly. Something similar in the UK is the government-funded GRID Computing Now! initiative.

Other interesting organisations (both US based) include the Climate Savers Computing Initiative and Greener Computing, which is an environmentally-responsible computing news site. I’ve had a look for some similar organisations closer to home, but with no luck.

However, here are some other resources that might be of interest (although there’s not much out there that’s very recent). If you know of any other useful sites or articles, send ‘em over. Do you have any tips for other freelancers or people working from home? Send them too!