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Dear
EarthTalk: As an online gamer, I spend a lot of time
in front of my computer. What’s the environmental impact?
And are “greener” PCs available?
-- Bob Grant,
Burlington, VT
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An
inefficient gaming PC with powerful graphics card,
multiple hard drives and optical drives, flash memory
reader and a 30-inch LCD might consume as much as
750 watts, or about as much as a typical refrigerator.
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Online
gamers and other heavy computer users are definitely leaving
an environmental mark. Depending on when it was made and
how it was designed, a standard desktop PC can use anywhere
from 60-300 watts when in use, while an inefficient gaming
PC with powerful graphics card, multiple hard drives and
optical drives, flash memory reader and a 30-inch LCD might
consume as much as 750 watts, or about as much as a typical
refrigerator. Until July of 2007, government Energy Star
requirements only measured a computer’s energy use
while in standby mode, which allowed the majority of brands
to carry the label.
New stricter
efficiency requirements have brought greener models. You’ll
find the largest selection from companies like Dell and
Hewlett Packard. Many businesses use the Electronic Products
Environmental Assessment Tool (EPEAT) to assist in the purchase
of greener computing systems, and the evaluations can be
useful to consumers, too. EPEAT evaluates and rates computing
equipment on 28 efficiency and sustainability criteria,
awarding them bronze, silver or gold for overall performance.
Technology company
VIA is well regarded as an industry leader in low-wattage
processors (central processing units or CPUs), with some
barely sipping only a dozen or so watts from the power supply.
Some typical VIA designs can outperform competitors using
only 23 watts, or less than half the power called for by
Energy Star specifications. Of course graphics cards used
by PC gamers are serious energy hogs. Your top-end ATI or
nVidia card will render great graphics, but use 300 watts
or more. Newer cards are better, but much depends on their
use. The best advice is to buy only the graphics power you
need.
One of the easiest
ways to save on computer power is to use technology that
automatically rests when you do, and to shut your computer
down when you’re not using it. Windows XP allows users
to configure power management settings, and Vista Ultimate
lets you configure power-saving options in even more ways.
Vista can actually throttle its power consumption for some
tasks and power down at other times. If you’re just
typing a Microsoft Word document, performance will back
down, whereas if you are editing video in a powerful program
like Adobe Premier Pro, Vista will use all the processing
power available.
Bear in mind
that screen savers are not energy savers. In fact, power-down
features may not work if you have a screen saver activated.
Happily, LCD color monitors do not need screen savers. In
terms of shutting down, while PCs use a small amount of
energy when they start up, it’s considerably less than
the energy used when they are on for long periods of time.
Consider turning off the monitor if you aren’t going
to use your PC for more than 20 minutes, and both the CPU
and monitor if you’re not going to use your PC for
more than two hours.
If you’re
concerned about the “wear and tear” of turning
PCs on and off, don’t be. Most PCs reach the end of
their “useful” life due to advances in technology
long before the effects of being switched on and off multiple
times can have a negative impact on their service life.
CONTACTS:
Energy
Star; EPEAT;
Recycling
an old monitor; VIA.
Dear EarthTalk:
Vegetarians and vegans are so self-righteous about not
eating meat and how meat eating is so bad for the environment.
How true are these claims?
-- Frank Doolittle,
Sudbury, MA
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There
are 20 billion head of livestock on Earth, more than
triple the number of people. Just about every aspect
of meat production - from grazing-related loss
of cropland, to water and land use, to pollution from
“factory farms” - is an environmental
disaster with wide and sometimes catastrophic consequences.
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There has never
been a better time to go vegetarian. Mounting evidence suggests
that meat-based diets are not only unhealthy, but that just
about every aspect of meat production—from grazing-related
loss of cropland, to the inefficiencies of feeding vast
quantities of water and grain to cattle, to pollution from
“factory farms”—is an environmental disaster
with wide and sometimes catastrophic consequences.
There are 20
billion head of livestock on Earth, more than triple the
number of people. According to the Worldwatch Institute,
global livestock population has increased 60 percent since
1961, and the number of fowl being raised for food has nearly
quadrupled in the same time period, from 4.2 billion to
15.7 billion.
The 4.8 pounds
of grain fed to cattle to make one pound of beef represents
a colossal waste of resources in a world teeming with hungry
and malnourished people. According to Vegfam, a 10-acre
farm can support 60 people growing soy, 24 people growing
wheat, 10 people growing corn—but only two raising
cattle.
Food First’s
Frances Moore Lappé says to imagine sitting down
to an eight-ounce steak. “Then imagine the room filled
with 45 to 50 people with empty bowls... For the feed cost
of your steak, each of their bowls could be filled with
a full cup of cooked cereal grains.” Harvard nutritionist
Jean Mayer says that reducing U.S. meat production 10 percent
would free grain to feed 60 million people.
U.S. animal farms
generate billion of tons of animal waste every year, which
the Environmental Protection Agency says pollute our waterways
more than all other industrial sources combined. The infamous
1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill dumped 11 million gallons of
oil into Prudoe Bay, but the relatively unknown 1995 New
River hog waste spill in North Carolina poured 25 million
gallons of excrement into the water, killing 14 million
fish and closing 364,000 acres of shell fishing beds. Hog
waste spills have caused the rapid spread of Pfiesteria
piscicida, which has killed a billion fish in North Carolina
alone.
Other than polluting
water, beef production alone uses more water than is used
in growing our entire fruit and vegetable crop. And over
a third of all raw materials and fossil fuels consumed in
the U.S. are used in animal production. Meat also increases
our carbon footprints. According to the United Nations’
Food and Agriculture Organization, livestock around the
world contribute more greenhouse gases (mostly methane)
to the atmosphere—18 percent of our total output—than
emissions from all the world’s cars and trucks.
“There is
no question that the choice to become a vegetarian or lower
meat consumption is one of the most positive lifestyle changes
a person could make in terms of reducing one’s personal
impact on the environment,” says Christopher Flavin
of the Worldwatch Institute. “The resource requirements
and environmental degradation associated with a meat-based
diet are very substantial.”
CONTACTS:
Food
First; UN
Food and Agriculture Organization; Worldwatch
Institute.
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