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• Posted Sept. 4, 2015, 2:01 p.m. - 9 years, 3 months ago

Sustainability in the workplace; 6 months on

We wrote back in March about reducing the environmental impact of offices and workplaces, but nearly 6 months on, has this really taken hold? Saving paper, working electronically and buying environmentally friendly paper are all great ideas and sound great in theory, but do they actually work in practice, and have retailers and offices made an effort to reduce their environmental impact?

Environmentally Friendly Paper

 

NORPAC (North Pacific Paper Co) unveiled their newest invention in August – Natural Choice Paper, which is environmentally friendly and made via a chlorine-free process of grinding Douglas fir wood into pulp. Douglas firs are one of the most prominent trees along the I-5 corridor and as such an extremely renewable and sustainable resource. In addition, ground-wood paper has a much higher yield than chemical pulp, meaning twice as much paper can be made from the same tree.

 

Natural Choice Paper retails from NORPAC at approx. $25 per carton, with around 13 cartons being produced per tree, which is the equivalent of 65,000 sheets of paper. This means each tree can give 845,000 sheets and cost $325 to buyers.

 

Saving Paper

 

The city of Frisco, in Texas, have introduced e-billing to their utility customers. Currently optional, this aims to reduce the amount of paper bills being sent out to residents and increases the department’s environmental friendliness. Residents and businesses have been asking for this service for a while, as it in turn means they have the convenience of their bills being securely accessible online, and their own costs for filing, archiving and shredding will decrease.

 

The first electronic bills are due to be emailed Oct 1st to all that have enrolled in this service.

 

Cloud Collaboration

 

Harvard Business have released a new report showing that, over the past 12 months, businesses are finding that not being in the cloud is turning into a “serious disadvantage”. This is because the cloud is now seen as much more of an accepted part of enterprise IT operations, and with competitors using it to share content with clients and businesses alike, it’s becoming increasingly important to utilise the cloud and everything it can offer.

 

Environmentally, this has also helped businesses use less paper, as collaboration can be undertaken by all invited parties in an online environment, reducing the need to print and review, as well as send printed documents by post.

• Business, Collaboration & Productivity
• Productivity