subject: Using Technology to Cut Back on Resource Use [print this page] Every office relies on technology for lots of things. However, when not used consciously, there are practices that use lots of paper and energy. There are ways to make the office more sustainable simply by altering what we do on the computer.
Computer printouts should be more than one page on each sheet. This works out especially well for PowerPoint presentations, where the bullet points can usually be easily read even with the smaller view. In the print dialog, just choose Handouts from the "Print what" drop-down, and then choose the number of slides per page you want. You can also save some ink by printing only in Grayscale. There is a similar setting in Microsoft Word's print dialog as well, where you can choose the number of pages per sheet. Printing two pages per sheet keeps things readable. Many laser printers also provide a simple duplex option that will print on both sides of the paper.
How many times have you printed off what you thought was a single page document and ended up with an almost empty page at the end? If you always click the print button without previewing first, it wastes ink and paper when your document ends on a single line, or ends up being unreadable. When you use "Print Preview "this is prevented and you print exactly what you want. Firefox and Internet Explorer each have an option called "Shrink to Fit" in their Print Preview dialogs which will often shrink the content down enough to fit on fewer pages. You can also choose a custom zoom level to fit even more on a single page. Microsoft Word also has an option called "Shrink One Page" which will attempt to shrink the document by one page by reducing the size and spacing of the page.
Instead of printing a single selection at a time, you can select multiple areas on the page and "clip" them for later printing on a single page with the HP Smart Web Printing application. This application can save a serious amount of paper if you print addresses or contact information from a number of places at once.
If you are using an inkjet printer, there's really no need to print in high or even medium quality for simple things, like driving directions or articles you want to read offline. You'll save on ink by setting Fast Draft as the default option in the printer properties. All you do is simply open up the Printers folder and right-click on your printer, choosing Printing Preferences. From there, you can change your printing settings. Instead of printing documents to paper, you can print them to environmentally friendly PDF files that can easily be emailed.
If you're a fan of more automated solutions, try GreenPrint. It's a free application that works as a virtual printer to catch documents before being sent to the printer. You can remove blank pages or anything that you don't want to print, or even an option to print to PDF instead of paper. You also see a report of how much paper and money you have saved. With a few extra keystrokes you can start on your path to an eco-friendly office, not to mention the savings associated with conserving office resources.
