How to make your computer and gadgets more environmentally friendly

We all use PC’s pretty much every day but we don’t realize all the different ways that we can save energy to help stop Climate Change while using computers.  By using sites like Blackle or Ecofree.org you can save at least twenty-five watts. You may think this is nothing and won’t help but if everyone does this it will help quite a lot. Other ways to lower energy usage while browsing the web or just on the computers are to go into the System and Maintenance section in Control Panel and then select Power Options. You can then set this to Balanced, Power saver or High performance (Only on Vista). This will lower the energy usage of your computer. Blackle.com was started in January 2007 by Toby Heap. The Blackle home page shows the number of megawatt-hours that have been saved by using the site.

Darren Yates who is a technology journalist did a test which concluded that when displaying light things on PCs such as Google LCD monitors save more energy than CRT monitors. Just this month Sony has launched an eco-friendly mini laptop. The new Vaio W Series is so green it doesn’t even need an instruction manual. Despite them being eco-friendly the notebooks still have a high definition 10.1 inch screen and a maximum of   250 gigabytes of storage.

Although if you want a computer that will definitely be eco-friendly I would go to Epeat.net which has a list of computers and companies and how green they are. Surprisingly Apple meets all the requirements for EPEATS criteria. Also if you’re wanting something that will be able to do simple tasks like browsing the internet and editing document and you like Apple and Mac operating systems and gadgets then why not try the iPod touch or iPhone because compared to an Apple Mac they use a very small amount of watts. The iPod or iPhone use 0.7 to 2 watts but the Mac Pro uses at least 115 – 263 watts. Plus on January 22nd it was reported that Apple were experimenting with trying to power the iPod and iPhone on solar power. They have been thinking of putting some small solar panels behind the screen. This will be something to look forward to.

On the other hand there are a few new operating systems that look as though they may be an improvement to power usage. These include Windows seven and the iPad but the iPad isn’t released in the UK until March 2010. The new iPad uses about 2.5 watts per hour.

It seems that Apple have found greener ways of using computers but Microsoft and other companies are still catching up with Apple. I’m in favour of Windows as I have Windows Vista myself but Apple is a long way ahead with green technology.

Apple aren't the only ones going for green tech though. In 2007 another American computer company called Lenova released the ThinkCentre A61e which apparently only uses forty-five watts. It's also twenty-five percent smaller than earlier ThinkCentre PCs. It's also compatible with the Solar-PowerPC II which is a solar power charger. The solar panel is one-hundred and ten watts and if the battery of the device being charged is fully drained it will take approximately ten to twelve hours to charge up in direct sunlight.

The PC is made up of approximately ninety percent recyclable and the computer itself is made up of ninety percent reusable materials and its EPEAT rating is Gold. Overall there are many ways to be environmentally friendly when on your computer or portable device and some are still in development. I hope this is some use to you and hope you will start using these tools as well.