Jane Powerson corporate waste
We've all made (and even broken) our New Year's resolutions by now. That is, we have as individuals. But with some businesses only now cranking back into action after the Christmas break, perhaps it's an appropriate time for corporate types to make a few pledges.
Every day this column hears from readers who are making changes in their private lives: turning off lights, lowering thermostats, cutting down on air travel, consuming less, recycling more and generally doing their bit. But all the little things that these individuals are doing to conserve the planet's precious resources - often at some discomfort to themselves - are trampled over by the world of business, with its clod-hopping disregard for waste.
Top of my irritation list for gratuitous and in-your-face waste
are the heating units that blast down from the entrances of
supermarkets and department stores. Usually the doors are wide open
- indeed, in the case of my nearest 24-hour supermarket, there are
no doors. Heating the pavement and the
outside air is not a good idea.
Leaving the lights on in empty offices is an equally bad idea. There is a myth that fluorescent lamps use heaps of electricity to get started: in fact they use just a few seconds' worth of extra power each time they are turned on. The other myth is that switching them off and on shortens their lifespan. It does -infinitesimally - but so does leaving them burning, which is also an unnecessary expense. It makes economic and environmental sense to turn them off. The same goes for computers and office machines. A desktop computer and monitor expend from 60 to 250 watts (or occasionally more) when turned on, as opposed to about six watts when on standby. When turned off, they use zero watts.
Office refurbishments generate skiploads of landfill: perfectly
good furniture and organisational equipment is thrown away. (I've
kitted out my own home office courtesy of a number of businesses on
my road.) Web-based recycling facilities, such as
www.freecycle.organd the
Free Trade service at
www.dublinwaste.ie, ensure
that items can be saved from the skip and given a new lease of life
with another owner.
The final area where companies might cut down on their waste is especially germane today, when we take down our Yuletide decorations. None of us needs to receive Christmas cards scrawled by an illegible corporate Ciara - or does that say Ciaran? Well, whoever they are, I wish them a thrifty new year.