Ed #13 Balance

Keep in mind too that all communications media leave a carbon footprint. Making a CD or DVD, both of which are difficult to recycle at best, generates around 300 to 350 grams of CO2 per copy9, while printing a 100-page four-color annual report releases about 80 grams.10 Even Web-based communications have a carbon impact—both in terms of the electricity needed to power the computers involved and the metals, plastics and other materials that go into their construction.

Burning a CD produces 4 times as much CO2 as printing a single annual report.

Then there are data centers built to handle the rising flood of e-communications around the world. The power needed to heat, cool and power a data facility is enormous. According to the New York Times, data centers around the world consume more energy in one year than the entire country of Sweden. From 2000 to 2005, the use of electricity by data centers doubled, and the increase shows no sign of abating. Expansion of Internet businesses, along with new data retention and compliance agreements, new accounting standards and other trends, fuel the demand.

There are other, less-obvious drawbacks, too. E-communications have not really created the paperless office as many would assume. In fact, it often seems to promote the spread of paper use. Even in today’s age of the Blackberry® and iPhone, people like to print things out—many just find it easier to read and easier to navigate on paper. But converting e-communications to print is often very inefficient. Imagine the number of times a 50-page PowerPoint presentation is printed out and distributed, when the information would probably be better boiled down and produced as a print-on-demand brochure.

Electronic media have no tactile feel, and communication materials residing there continue to draw electrical power as long as they are in the system. And even today, not everyone is computer savvy or has access to a computer. For example, if your a local arts center, you may see enrollment drop off if you replace your paper catalog of course offerings by an on-line only version—because the older members of your client base are not used to operating that way. An integrated marketing strategy that includes both print on-line components spans preferences and generations, allowing all to get the message.

Spam emails sent annually, have the footprint of driving a car around the globe 1.6 million times.

Then there’s spam. It’s not just a nuisance—many see it as a major source of global climate change. It is hard to measure, but some calculations say that each spam message, including the energy required to delete the message, represents the energy equivalent of driving three feet. Multiply that by yearly volume and it is equivalent to driving around the world 1.6 million times.11

9 http://www.finsbury.com.au/NewsDetail.aspx?p=15&id=64
10 http://www.printnet.com.au/verve/_resources/AP_NOV_p42.pdf
11 Source: McAfee, The Carbon Footprint of Email Spam Report