MICROSOFT ENVIRONMENT SUSTAINABILITY

WORK SMART GUIDE

The Environmental Sustainability Work Smart Guide offers tips and practical steps—from Microsoft Information Technol-
ogy and Operations—that workers anywhere can follow on a daily basis to reduce their environmental impact while also
reducing corporate costs.
Topics in this guide include: Maintain a Paperless, Digital Office; Procure Energy-Efficient Hardware; Manage Power Con-
sumption; Recycle Hardware and Peripherals.

Maintain a Paperless, Digital Office
You can help preserve natural resources and Rather than using a private printer, use Se-
maintain a paperless, digital office by taking cure Print functionality for sensitive or con-
the following actions:
1. Change your printing behavior.
2. Use public multifunction machines.
3. Use Unified Communication and Mi-
crosoft Office collaboration tools.
Printing: Do You Have To?
Employees leave approximately 35 percent
of their print jobs in the copy rooms. This
significant waste of paper and toner also
results in needless carbon dioxide (CO2)
emissions from printers.
Microsoft IT recommends that you:
 Print on both sides. This is the default
setting on all Digital Campus public
printers.
 Print more than one page or slide per
side of paper.
 Use black-and-white instead of color.
Using any color on the page, including
logos or accent lines, incurs a color-
usage cost, which is approximately 8.5 Procure Energy-Efficient Hardware
times more expensive than black and
white.
 Instead of sending physical copies for
meetings, share your document by
sending a link. Attendees can view it on Qualified can
their laptops.
 Connect your laptop to a meeting room are energy effi-
projector and display the document
electronically. For more information,
refer to the “Connect and Collaborate”
section later in this document.
Personal Printers: Don’t Use Them
If you must print, use the public, multifunc-
tion machines that your organization most
likely provides. Private printers result in
hidden fiscal and environmental costs, in-
cluding: increased support costs; energy
consumption; CO2 emissions; and paper,
cartridge, and toner waste.
Secure Print: Protect Your Confidential To better manage your power consumption:
Print Jobs
 Get aggressive with your PC power
settings.
fidential information. Secure Print enables
you to send a job to a specific printer’s  Turn off your computer when you are
queue, where it sits until you go to the print- not using it.
er and release it by entering a four-digit per-
sonal identification number (PIN).  Turn off lights and unplug peripherals.
Get Aggressive with Your Power Settings
Connect and Collaborate Many IT organizations preset the power-
Microsoft IT estimates that employees who saving settings for each new PC based on
adopt Unified Communications (UC) tech- the Windows 7 Balanced plan. This plan
nologies realize a 30-minute-per-day produc- offers full performance while your PC is in
use and saves power during periods of inac-
tivity savings.
tivity by putting your PC to sleep. Microsoft
Using these technologies and Microsoft® IT customizes the Balanced plan settings so
Office collaboration tools also contributes to the screen sleeps after five minutes of inac-
environmental sustainability because em- tivity; the CPU sleeps after 30 minutes.
ployees:
To set these standards:
Click Start, click Control Panel, click Sys-
 Use less paper and printer toner.
tem and Maintenance, and then click Pow-
 Reduce printer emissions. er Options.
 Reduce carbon emissions from business On the Power Options screen, select the
travel and commuting.
Balanced plan.
 Reduce energy usage and costs by re-
Caution:
ducing use of offices and meeting
rooms.
Purchasing new
PCs or periph-
erals that are
ENERGY STAR
help ensure that
your purchases
cient and envi-
ronmentally friendly.
Microsoft IT does not recommend the High
More information about ENERGY STAR
Performance plan because it disables most
can be found at http://www.energystar.gov.
power-saving features and offers a minimal
Manage Power Consumption processor-performance boost over the Bal-
If employees practice better PC client power anced plan.
management, your organization can reduce In the left panel, click Change when the
its power consumption substantially. Addi-
tional savings are possible with conscien- computer sleeps.
tious use of lighting and electrical equip-
ment.
In the Change settings for the plan: Bal-
anced screen, set the Plugged in parameters
to 5 minutes for the display and 30 minutes
to put the computer to sleep.
Note: To reactivate your screen, move the
mouse or press the SPACEBAR. To wake
your PC, briefly push the power button.
Please note that directions for waking your
computer vary with different manufacturers,
so expect some trial and error.
Screen savers can prevent the screen and
CPU from going to sleep. Disable your
screen savers or use a blank screen. Click
Start, click Control Panel, click Appearance ty.
and Personalization, click Personalization,
click Screen Saver, and then under Screen
Saver, select None from the list. Turn Your Turn off office lights and lamps when you
Computer Off
Microsoft IT estimates that 72 percent of
computers remain on at night. The single,
most important step you can take to reduce
PC-based power consumption is to turn
your computer off when you leave the office
or anticipate an extended period of inactivi-
Turn Off Lights and Unplug Peripherals
leave for the night, weekend, or on trips.
Other energy-saving actions include:
Unplug radios, music players, chargers, and
other items in your office before leaving for
the evening. Even if turned off, they contin-
ue using energy while plugged in. Put these
devices on a single power strip so that you
can click one switch to turn them off.
Take responsibility for public spaces that
you or your colleagues use for after-hours
events. Turn off lights and peripherals, and
unplug equipment that you use for the
event.
Do not use space heaters to stay warm dur-
ing the cold weather.
Recycle Hardware and Peripherals
Recycle retired or broken computers, moni-
tors, peripherals and mobile devices.
For More Work Smart Content visit
http://microsoft.com/itshowcase

Find out more about Unified Communication and Office Collaboration Technologies.

Application Description Link

Microsoft® Office See the availability of your contacts, and then click to communicate. http://www.microsoft.com/
Communicator 2007 Conduct secure instant messaging (IM) with your colleagues as well as communicationsserver/en/us/user-
MSN, AOL, and Yahoo! contacts. Place, receive or forward calls using interfaces.aspx
Voice over IP (VoIP).

Microsoft® Office Provides your mobile device with the same secure instant messaging as http://www.microsoft.com/
Communicator Mobile your PC. communicationsserver/en/us/user-
interfaces.aspx

Microsoft® Office Live Meet online and collaborate on files with people in different locations. http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/
Meeting Conduct live presentations and demonstrations and record your event. livemeeting/default.aspx

Microsoft® Exchange Integrates voicemail, e-mail, faxes, and calendar information into one http://www.microsoft.com/exchange/
Server 2007 Unified inbox, and enables you to reply to e-mail and calendar requests over the evaluation/unifiedmessaging/default.mspx
Messaging phone.

Microsoft® Displays a 360-degree view of meetings through a speaker/video www.microsoft.com/uc/products/

RoundTable™ phone, and enables you to record meetings. roundtable.mspx

Microsoft® Office Take notes, organize information, and collaborate, using text and http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/onenote/
OneNote® 2007 graphics in a file folder arrangement. default.aspx

Microsoft® Office Share files in a central work site, allow version control, track tasks and www.microsoft.com/sharepoint/default.mspx
SharePoint® Server schedules, and exchange e-mail.
2007

Microsoft® Office Provides a workspace for project management and file sharing where http://office.microsoft.com/en-gb/groove/
Groove® 2007 team members from different organizations can synchronize and co-edit default.aspx
files remotely.