Are You Joining Earth Hour?

For one hour this Saturday night nearly 200 cities around the world, will go dark in what the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) is calling the largest planned power outage in history. This event is an effort to raise awareness about power consumption and climate change.

More than 2.2 million people participated in the inaugural Earth Hour last year, in which just one city – Sydney, Australia – went dark. The one hour outage produced a 10 percent drop in energy usage during the hour – double what had been predicted.

On March 29, 2008 at 8 p.m., join millions of people around the world in making a statement about climate change by turning off your lights for Earth Hour.

In the United States, we are a “throwaway society”. Because of the great economy we have experienced in the past, it was just easier to throw things away and buy new. This mentality applies to energy as well, and we don’t think twice about hopping in the car to drive to the store down the street. We are paying for this lifestyle now, though, with global warming and reduced natural resources. Unfortunately, it’s hard to change habits that have formed over a lifetime, and I find most people “allergic” to change. Two things that will go a long way towards changing this mentality is the fact that global warming can no longer be called a dooms-day prediction by hysterical scientists, and the very real recession we are facing in the United States.

Facebook has this new Facebook Footprint Calculator that I thought was very informative. If you’re not on Facebook, there’s also a One Minute Calculator. While this calculator is very general, and you may be instituting different things in your home and workplace to reduce your footprint, it is a real eye opener for people who have no clue how their daily living impacts our environment. To get even more detailed try this calculator, this drills right down to what state you live in.

According to the Facebook calculator, by becoming a Virtual Assistant, I reduced my carbon footprint from 23.08 to 7.21 tons per year – Wow! According to the more detailed calculator, my footprint is only 1.8 tons per year. The national average is 7.5 tons per year, and while I feel that I can do more to make a difference, I think it’s a good start.

The only difference that this calculator could determine was the driving. I used to drive 100 miles a day (at minimum) to get to work. I now work at home and reduce my footprint even more, since being a business owner I get to determine the standards and policies to implement. I use recycled paper, but in today’s technological world, I don’t have very many things I actually have to print. I use compact fluorescent lights in my office, and am in the process of changing my home lighting. I turn off the computer, printer, calculator, lights, etc. when I leave the office.
For those of you who are not aware of this term, a Virtual Assistant (VA) is a highly-trained independent entrepreneur who provides a myriad of business support services virtually via phone, fax and internet based technology to support and meet the growing needs of businesses worldwide. *Source: Virtual Assistant Networking Association (VANA)

A few examples of lowering your carbon footprint in your home are:

• Switch to compact fluorescent light bulbs to save money and reduce emissions. Lighting accounts for around 5% of household greenhouse gas emissions, and compact fluros use 75% less energy than an equivalent incandescent bulb. Although the bulbs cost more up-front, you will actually save money through the energy saved and extended life of the bulb.
• Turn appliances off while not in use. Unplug any appliances like mobile phone chargers, TVs, microwaves, MP3 players, which are not being used and are on standby. Appliances on standby consume up to 10% of your electricity bill.
• Turn off anything that doesn’t need to be on. A good rule is to turn off anything not being used. When you leave a room or leave the house, turn off your lights or appliances like the TV or computer.
• Use less hot water. This is not only a good water saving tip, it saves electricity too. Spend one minute less in the shower.

At work:

• Get off standby. Speak to your office manager about turning off any equipment at work that is not being used, including computer screens, photocopiers and printers, particularly when you leave at night.
• Turn off lights at the end of the working day. Before you leave your place of work remember to turn off any lights in your workspace and your computer if you use one at work. Remember to unplug your mobile phone or laptop charger when it’s not in use. Speak to your office manager about installing motion-sensor lighting after 5pm when most people have gone home.
• Find out what’s happening in your workplace. Ask about your company’s emissions reduction policies and find out what’s already happening. Look for ways to reduce energy use in your workplace and encourage improvements. If employers know their employees are keen to make their workplaces environmentally friendly, they’ll be even more inclined to take action.
• Encourage your organization to have measurable emissions reduction targets. Many businesses are committing to emissions targets and have plans to be carbon neutral by a certain date. Switching to green power, reducing and offsetting energy use and travel, and incorporating this into all areas of the business are critical to this process. Does your company have a plan?

Many companies are turning to more flexible schedules, allowing employees to work from home, and outsourcing some of the daily routine tasks. One huge retailer that I used to work for is actually making great strides in becoming “green”. That didn’t stop me from laughing 15 years ago when they announced to the staff that they were “going paperless”. For this company, which meant instead of using 10 reams of paper for daily reports, we only had to use 7 reams – per store. At the time, they had about 3,000 stores – you do the math. I do have to say, they keep plugging away and trying to lower their carbon footprint in different ways daily.

How will becoming more flexible with scheduling or outsourcing some of your administrative needs lower your carbon footprint? It’s worth thinking about.

Pat Zappavigna is the owner of Instant Office Assistant, an administrative support services company. You can contact Pat at pazappa@verizon.net or through the website www.InstantOfficeAssistant.com.