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Going Green!
We are often asked by our law-firm clients how we can assist them in their efforts to "go green." Which is why we've given this issue a lot of thought.
One popular misconception is that the best way to "go green" is to not print. Unfortunately, that doesn't make much sense. Employees come to work each day and need to use paper and toner and other consumables in order to do their jobs. Asking them to cut back on their printing just isn't feasible. What management ought to be telling their users is not to "not print" but to be "less wasteful."
Here are a few suggestions you may not have considered:
- Use two-sided (duplex) printing whenever possible which, of course, reduces paper consumption by half.
- Recycle your waste, including toner cartridges, the toner cartridge packaging, and the printer paper you discard.
- Purchase only recycled paper which, in turn, creates a demand for recycled product.
- Utilize printers and copiers that use less electricity.
- Purchase only those products that utilize minimal packaging.
- Buy remanufactured toner and inkjet cartridges.
And then there is the issue of "end-of-life management." What happens when you decide to update your equipment? You buy all new equipment and shove the old into a storeroom where it just sits collecting dust with the belief that it can be redeployed if needed, right? But printers have dropped in price over time. It would be wiser to invest in new equipment with new features (that uses less electricity and that has less waste) than it would be to hold onto old inventory that will end up costing more over time.
Lastly -- and this is such an easy and effective way to save on electricity -- when you're not using your equipment, schedule it to go into sleep mode. Advantage can schedule your printer for sleep mode on a regular work-week schedule and a holiday schedule. This is a far better alternative to turning off your equipment at night or on weekends because many printers go through a cleansing and recalibration process every time you turn them back on. That process purges a portion of your toner, creating unnecessary waste, which is just what you're trying to avoid.
If you have any questions about other simple things you can do to become "more green," we'd be happy to consult with you.
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Morrison & Foerster's Jason Perez
 Jason Perez is senior manager of workplace technology at Morrison & Foerster LLP, in charge of the law firm's global systems, including e-mail, PCs, printers, remote access systems, Web systems, and desktop applications. Recently he took a few minutes to chat about his company's "green initiatives."
Advantage: Jason, what's the motivation for a law firm to "go green?"
Jason Perez: I believe that every organization should be looking at green initiatives these days, not just law firms. But Morrison & Foerster is a very progressive firm and we care about our social responsibilities which is why we have a "Clean Tech" practice group that helps our clients with emerging clean technologies and environmental concerns and issues. I focus on IT which is where we frequently discuss what our green strategies should be.
Advantage: And what are some of those strategies?
Perez: From a technology perspective, it starts with our procurement. Our procurement staff -- which purchases everything from PCs to printers to paper -- is asking its vendors what they are doing to be "green suppliers" for us. The staff wants to know where the materials it buys are coming from and how the products are contributing to our roster of green strategies. That's something we didn't do several years ago. But it's become an important part of the decision-making process when we select our suppliers.
Advantage: Give me an example of what you'd consider a "green purchase."
Perez: For instance, it's a known fact that LCD monitors use about 40% of the power that a normal CRT monitor uses. So not only have we switched to LCD monitors, but when we choose our vendors, we want information on their products' power consumption and how it compares with the competition. We estimate that by swapping out our monitors, we were able to save approximately 620 megawatts per year of power savings. That's the equivalent of the power used in 58 average American homes per year. So it's a huge cost savings for us and also good for the environment.
Advantage: Anything else you'd recommend?
Perez: We are aggressively pushing forward with movement to virtual servers from physical ones which consume a lot of power. At the end of the day, that will not only save the firm money, it will take us one step closer to a comprehensive green strategy. Also, Advantage arranged for us to use recycled toner cartridges. We've estimated that's 7.2 tons of toner cartridges that are being diverted from local landfills because they are being recycled through Advantage. Not only are we saving money, but we are helping save the environment. And that's the goal, right?
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Spring Cleaning Tips!
 "We have a backroom stacked to the rafters with old printers and other equipment we no longer use. We originally put it there thinking that if we needed to have an extra unit or a loaner, we'd go to the storeroom and pull it out. But, instead, it's become just a big junkpile. So now we need to get rid of it all, but it's a big project to decide what can be thrown out and where it should go. Do you have any tips on the best way to do an effective spring cleaning?"
 What you need is an effective lifecycle management program which forces you to make decisions about what you want to do with your retired equipment whenever you do a technology refresh. That creates a technology cycle for your office instead of a back-of-the-office dumping ground.
Instead, may we suggest that Advantage picks up your retired printers and donates them to the Hewlett-Packard recycling program where they will be crushed, melted, or sent to a third-world country depending on their condition. It's a free service that enables you to be green and to put your old equipment somewhere that's environmentally responsible.
At the same time, we can give you a little lesson in lifecycle management for your newer equipment which hasn't made it to the storeroom yet.
Let Advantage Enterprises solve your print-related problems by sending your questions to marketing@advtg.com.
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| About Us |
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Advantage Enterprises delivers advisory and managed print services, primarily to Am Law 100 law firms so they can focus on their highest and best purpose of billing their time and growing their client base.
For over 20 years, Advantage's environmentally green lifecycle management programs have increased productivity of printing and imaging fleets and cut costs while saving the environment.
To learn more about what gives the top law firms their competitive edge, please visit our Web site at www.advtg.com
or e-mail us at
marketing@advtg.com.
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