by Simon Wright

Created on: February 06, 2007   Last Updated: February 11, 2010

There’s a lot of debate about the threat of climate change and its potential severity. Those who champion the green cause point out that the felling of trees means that more carbon will stay in the atmosphere, as trees play an important role in absorbing carbon. This, in turn, contributes towards global warming.

Even if you don’t subscribe to the climate change theory, it still makes great sense to be parsimonious in our usage of paper. Forests (and in particular rain forests) are a great resource and the clearing of them has many negative consequences, notwithstanding the impact upon climate. Pharmaceutical companies, for example, view rain forests as vital to help them identify new sources of drugs that can be used in the treatment of patients. On top of that, forests provide a habitat for many wonderful species, such as our close relatives the orang-utans, and we would be much worse off without the huge biodiversity that forests currently play host to.

Let’s look then at some tips for saving paper, which will (in turn) help to save trees and our forests:

- Use e-mail/texts instead of sending letters. This is a social trend that has already become pretty entrenched and there are very few occasions these days when the option of sending an electronic communication isn’t viable.

- Avoid printing off web/document pages if you can read them online instead. This particularly applies to people who work in offices. How many times have you seen someone print off a 30 page report to read, when they could have read (and made corrections, etc) on screen. Tip: When you send e-mails, include a footer stating 'please do not print this e-mail unless you really need to'

- Ask your bank to switch you to electronic bank statements rather than paper statements.

- Where you have to use paper, use recycled paper

- When disposing of paper and cardboard, etc, make sure you use recycling bins.

- When printing documents, make sure the printer settings are such that it prints out double-sided. Doing this at work will have particular benefits given the scale of documents that tend to be produced.

- When writing, be concise and don't use an overlarge font size. Most good reports and presentations can be condensed into 3 or 4 pages/slides.

- Get yourself removed from promotional mailings. They are annoying to receive and waste paper. In the UK, you can do this through the Mail Preference Service, http://www.mpsonline.org.uk/mpsr/

- Read online news rather than buying a newspaper.

Finally, get into the habit of thinking environmentally in your day to day life. For example, when you buy a bun from your local bakery, do you really need it to be put in a paper bag? It might only make a small difference but if millions of people all start making small differences, then they will start to add up.

Learn more about this author, Simon Wright.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.