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Going Green at the Office

The next time you climb over that mountain of paper in your wastebasket at the end of the day, perhaps you should consider whether it is time to take a serious look at your business operations and determine how to reduce your environmental impact. By adopting just one new sustainable behavior a month, an individual can have a significant, positive environmental impact by the end of the year. Just imagine what greening your entire office can do.

Employees at all levels of a firm or business can help green their working environment. Below are several areas to explore in making your office more environmentally friendly.

Communication

Survey at least one employee who can explain any existing sustainability initiative and act as a greening champion. Ask her the following:

  • What is currently being recycled (paper, plastic bottles, printer cartridges)?
  • What is the policy on electronics disposal?
  • Does the firm distribute all firm-wide communications electronically?

Procurement

Review your company’s purchasing policy and revise it to include products that are environmentally friendly, such as:

  • “post-consumer waste” products, including stationary, packaging materials, paper towels, and other supplies, which prevent waste from ending up in landfills; nontoxic cleaning supplies, inks, and other chemicals; and
  • throw-away products (plates, cutlery) made of materials such as cornstarch that will quickly break down in a landfill.

Surplus Products

  • Find innovative uses for excess inventory such as outdated electronics by partnering with local trade schools or recyclers.
  • Ask employees to come up with ways to turn that waste into something useful.

Consumption

  • Turn off lights and appliances that are not being used.
  • Replace high-energy-use light bulbs, fixtures, and equipment with their low-energy-use equivalents.
  • Conduct more business online by transmitting documents as PDFs via e-mail rather than by delivery service.
  • Consider purchasing Renewable Energy Credits to offset your company’s energy consumption.
  • Sponsor office challenges to encourage sustainable use of resources.

Lifestyle Changes

o Reduce fuel consumption and pollution by encouraging carpooling and use of mass transit.
o Encourage reuse rather than waste by asking employees to bring their own coffee cups and water bottles to work instead of supplying them with wasteful paper, plastic, and Styrofoam cups. To make this work, you may need to have dishwashing space in each break room or add dishwashers.
o Institute paper, can, glass, and plastic recycling if your office has not already.

OFFICE SPACE

  • Review your leases to identify recycling services that are to be provided in your Common Area Maintenance charges and take advantage of building-wide activities.
  • Encourage other tenants in your building to participate in your greening initiatives.
  • If you are renovating or expanding an existing space or constructing a new office, be sure to ask your architect about green building options and installation of energy and water-saving devices.

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