5 easy habits to reduce your digital carbon footprint when using your laptop

Did you know that every Internet search, every email sent, everything you do on your computer adds to your carbon footprint? Here’s what you need to know about the impact of Internet on climate change and 5 easy ways to reduce your digital carbon footprint when using your laptop.

Why should we reduce our digital carbon footprint?

What is a digital carbon footprint?

We know that activities such as driving a car, keeping the lights on, buying food and clothes… add to our carbon footprint, but we don’t really think about the impact of other daily activities, such as using the Internet.

Why? Because Internet is “invisible” in a way, but the data is processed and stored in huge data centres that are working non-stop.

Plus, the energy powering your devices and connecting to wireless networks is also creating carbon dioxide emissions. All this data shared, all this information sent from a user to another, makes up our digital carbon footprint.

The impact of Internet on climate change

Yes, a single internet search or one email sent out will only generate a tiny amount of carbon dioxide, but now we are more than 4 billion Internet users. A report from the Shift Project estimates that the Internet and supporting systems account for about 3.7% of global greenhouses emissions, which is similar to the airline industry.

Not to mention that more and more people are getting access to Internet and that we’re collectively moving towards a more digital world, with remote working and the explosion of online media. “The energy consumption of digital technologies is increasing by 9% a year”, making our digital carbon footprint a growing concern.

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How to reduce your digital carbon footprint? 5 easy and free ways

It is very hard to accurately estimate our own digital carbon footprint, however there are very easy and free habits we can implement in our daily life to lower it. If we collectively make small changes, they will have a big impact.

1. Manage your emails

There are two things you can do here: sending less emails, and ensuring that you receive less emails.

The energy company OVO estimates that if every adult in the UK sent one less “thank you” email, it could save over 16 thousand tonnes of carbon a year – the equivalent to taking over 3,000 diesel cars off the road.

It’s also worth looking through your newsletters and unsubscribing from the ones you never read. Oh and make sure to empty your spam folder regularly, to avoid having useless emails stored.

2. Turn the brightness down

According to Harvard Law School’s energy manager, reducing the brightness to 70% can save up to 20% of the energy used by the monitor, increasing the battery life (as well as reducing eye strain).

3. Bookmark and search smart

Twitter, your online supermarket, your favourite news website… bookmark the pages you’re visiting often. Instead of processing a new search, going directly to the page is a super easy way to lower your digital carbon footprint.

Searching for something? Every search consumes power and the broader it is, the more search results you’re going to get. Before typing, try to narrow it down as much as possible to optimise your chance of finding what you’re looking for within your first search request.

4. Change your search engine

Have you heard of Ecosia? This search engine based in Germany uses the ad revenue from users searches to plant trees. The company donates 80% of its profits to NGOs that focus on reforestation and is B Lab certified. Using Ecosia is a great way to contribute to offsetting our collective digital carbon footprint.