Something fundamental is changing these days-- within the design community and in
society at large. It’s a questioning of assumptions that have carried us throught the last half of the twentieth century and into the beginning of the twenty-first. In our lifetimes, we’ve seen graphic deisgn blossom in the service of a vast, fast-growing society dominated by consumption. These have been the golden days of sophisticated technology and burgeoning communications needs. But this gold age has come at a price... and its’s probably coming to a close. As David Wann observed in Biologic, “Our investment choices of the last fifty or sixty years resemble a very steep cliff: don’t look down, because we’ve jsut poured trillions of dollars into an infrastructure of homes, shopping centers, workplaces, and highway systems that is frighteningly depended on the availablility of cheap oil and the assumption of convenience.” As the base of it all is design. One of the reasons our environmenet faces unprecedented difficulties is that we’ve accepted bad deisgn along with faulty thinking for too long. We use a disposable razor for a few days though its plastic structure will remain intact for hundreds of years. We drive five blocked to go to the store because our cities are not designed with enough bike trails. We shun those who litter openly, but think nothing of our poorly designed waste disposal system, which “hides” our garbage in landfills or turns solid waste into polluting gases through incineration. What can graphic designers really do about this?
A Few Easy Things You Can Do Now • Make internal memos and reports two-sided to reduce the number of pages. • Use routing slips to circulate memos or magazines rather than distributing multiple copies
of the same document.
• Stop buying and using disposable plastic, paper, and styrofoam products. • Use washable coffee mugs, plates, and utensils instead. Reuse your lunch bag. • Use a small removable label rather than a cover sheet to route a fax. This saves two pieces
of paper -- one on your end and one on the receiving end.
• Use voicemail or electronic mail to cut back the paper flow in your office.
Office lighting is another area with great source-reduction potential. In the United States, we still burn fossil fuels for 75 percent of our electrical energy. With about 25 percent of all U.S. electricity spent each year on lighting offices, stores, and warehouses, energy-efficient office lighting offers an opportunity to significantly reduce air pollution from power plants. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimates that installing efficient lighting systems could reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 232 million tons a year, or 4 percent of the nation’s total. In pollution reduction, that’s equivalent to taking 42 million cars off the road. Making your office lighting system more energy efficient can be complex. However, the results-- in terms of helping the environment, improving the quality of lighting in your office, and saving money-- make it a very rewarding option. And while it may not be something you can implement right away, it’s worth considering if you’re moving to a new space or renovating your existing space. The most important thing to remember when you review your options for a retrofit is that it’s best to take an integrated approach that recognizes the complex set of variables influencing lighting levels in your office. Taking full advantage of potential benefits in improved lighting quality with maximum efficiency and bottom line savings requires more than simply installing compact fluorescent lamps or reflectors. To adopt this approach, don’t try to do it on your own. Instead, seek advice from a lighting audit and will design a system that meets all of your needs. Your local utility company may be of help, too. Many utilities offer rebates to companies that install energy-efficient products because it helps them delay investing in new capacity. Known as “demand-side management,” this practice is becoming more common around the country.
The electricity consumed by computers, monitors, printers, scanners, and copies offers another great opportunity for source reduction. According to the EPA, annual power consumption by office equipment has risen 400 percent—from 25 billion to 125 billion kilowatt hours (kWh)— during the last ten years. Running your office equipment also generates heat, which you then remove with electrically powered air conditioners that are currently operating at an average of 44 percent efficiency. In the end, every watt that goes into a piece of office equipment represents about 3.3 watts of total demand, after you add the power used for air conditioning. A typical desktop computer uses 250 to 300 watts of power. However, new computers being introduced under the EPA’s Energy Star program may use as little as 60 watts. As you purchase new computers, be sure to add energy efficiency to your list of criteria. If you don’t have any immediate plans to buy new computers, changing the way you use your computer now can also greatly reduces energy consumption (and cost). According to Byte magazine, leaving your computer on all the time uses about 1,314 kWh per year at about $105 in direct electrical costs. Simply turning your computer off at night cuts energy consumption down to about 433 kWh per year at a cost of about $35. Resting your computer it’s not in use during the day cuts consumption further, to 216 kWh per year with a cost of $17 per year. You’ll also gain environmental benefits by cutting pollution right at the source.
Recycling is the next best step for eliminating waste after source reduction and reuse. Keeping waste out of landfills through recycling is a key element of environmental responsibility. This chapter will show you how to establish a collection program in your office that gives manufacturers that the high-quality waste they need to make high-quality, post-consumer recycled products. But please don’t stop here! Separating and collecting recyclable materials properly are essential, but they are only part of the solution. Read the next chapter to learn about the importance of “closing the loop” by buying recycled products
What’s Generally Recyclable • Aluminum Cans
• Laser-printed computer paper
• Brochures
• Magazines and newspapers
• Computer forms paper (white and
• Plain paper faxes (thermal fax paper may
colored, barred and non-barred)
be accepted with mixed wastepaper)
• Copier paper
• Plastic bottles
• Envelopes (without plastic windows)
• Scratch paper (white and colored)
• Glass beverage containers and jars
• Stationary
• Index and Rolodex cards
• Typing paper (white and colored) • Tracing paper/ Yellow pads
What’s Generally Non-Recyclable
• Blueprints
• Glued and gummed items, like notepads
• Carbon paper
• Juice boxes
• Cigarettes and cigarette packs
• Milk cartons
• Envelopes with plastic windows
• Paper lined with foil
• Facial tissue
• Paper towels