Paperless, energy-saving: The office with e-paper door labels
Reducing paper waste and conserving energy are giant leaps towards preserving the environment. Joan, the energy efficient electronic door label, is an advocate for a sustainable workplace.
Maintaining a sustainable work environment can manifest itself in many ways, but none so to the point than the effort of implementing a paperless and energy-saving office. Electronic paper door labels which replace wasteful paper slip notifications and conserve power tick off two boxes at the same time in the environmentalist’s to-do list.
It’s not easy being green …
What makes for a green workplace? Sustainability at your place of business can mean many things, from ditching the car and cycling to work to resource efficiency achieved through recycling office supplies and procuring local products with a low carbon footprint — all in recognition of the relationship between economy and the environment.
Power and paper consumption memo:
№1: Office equipment is the fastest growing energy user in today’s business.
№2: Nearly half of the paper printed every day ends up being discarded the very same day.
The biggest hurdle to jump when it comes to not overtaxing the environment is perhaps the question of conserving energy and reducing paper consumption within an office setting.
Crunching the numbers
Did you know for example that office equipment is the fastest growing energy user in the business world, with its consumption representing 15% of total electricity use in offices? This figure is expected to double by 2020. Even more: wasteful use of electronic office devices can mean that an energy bill of a typical office can end up costing 65% more than it would if the office was energy efficient.
When it comes to paper consumption, the figures are just as bad: in the U.S the average office worker uses up 10,000 sheets of paper every year, with 45% of the paper ending up discarded after only one day. This means that American companies are likely to spend more than $120 billion a year on printing alone. And that’s not the math you want to have.
Door labels: Letting go of paper by going the right kind of digital
With numbers like these, it’s no wonder that the most common advice in implementing a green and economical workplace is to digitize. After all, more work performed online and more documents reviewed on screen means less paper used and more money saved. And that’s the math you want to have.
American companies are likely to spend more than $120 billion a year on printing alone.
When it comes to door labels and notices, this seems like a no-brainer: continuously printing and replacing room availability and daily schedule paper notifications on doors and walls is nothing if not wasteful, in material, resources and time, and on top of that, it’s annoying. After all, the greenest paper is no paper at all and going electronic, saving time and hassle by implementing a digital screen of some sort instead of a paper door notification is the right way to go.
Robbing Peter to pay Paul?
Yes, but not at the expense of increasing electricity use.
Wasteful use of electronic office devices can add up to a 65% higher energy bill than that of an energy-efficient workplace.
When aiming for paperless room labels and a lighter ecological footprint, don’t forget about energy efficiency. Many door e-labels on the market sport screens just as power-hungry as your smartphone.
An LCD screen for example, used on many tablets in the function of a digital room sign, will require a significant amount of power to display its content, especially if you throw in a touchscreen and take into account the frequency of use likely to occur in an office setting.
Electronic paper screens will use up to 99% less power than LCDs.
Leaving aside the issues of electricity cables necessary for the sign to function and running interference with device installation, high power consumption makes an LCD sign just another electrical device that adds to the office power load, which makes it anything but efficient.
To put this into context: if 55 million conference rooms worldwide were equipped with iPad minis for room booking, this would result in about 110 Megawatts of constant energy consumption. In that case, forgetting to power off your computer before you go home is the least of your problems.
Super-saving with Joan
An electronic paper screen will use much less power than an LCD — up to 99% less. Why not decide for the better, more energy efficient solution then?
Aim for paperless room labels and a lighter ecological footprint, but don’t forget about device energy efficiency.
By installing an eink room booking solution such as Joan Meeting Room Assistant, enough power can be saved to provide lighting for 2 million average households, saving approximately US$100 million in electricity bills each year.
Eink’s energy efficiency stems from the unique way of how electronic paper works. For the layman: if you could apply such a dramatic increase in power saving to a car, it would run for six months on a single tank of gas. Now, wouldn’t that be nice? And inexpensive?
One thing’s for sure: it’s definitely nothing to sneeze at when it comes to conserving resources and staying green.
Originally published at getjoan.com on August 6, 2015.
