Seeing Green

by Tom McNichol

The reason the practice of law has become greener in recent years is that lawyers want to save the earth.

OK, that's one reason. Here's another: Running an environmentally friendly law practice is simply good business. Law firms can save a significant amount of money by reducing energy consumption and cutting down on the mountains of paper they consume. And being a good environmental steward can help attract business from like-minded clients, or those involved in green businesses.

Technology is a boon to individual lawyers who want to make their work habits a little greener. The key is getting hard data on just how big your environmental footprint is, and then finding the right technology to help reduce it. Consider these simple, low-cost tech strategies to help save money while saving the planet.

Monitor Your Juice
Not long ago, the only power law firms cared about was the legal clout wielded by their attorneys. But these days, the electrical power that firms consume can be almost as important.

Turning off computers, printers, and lights when they're not in use is a good start. But if you want to get serious about conserving electricity, you have to be able to measure your power consumption in real time. One inexpensive way to do that is with a portable electricity monitor like the Kill A Watt (www.p3international.com, about $25). Simply plug it into an electrical outlet, then connect any electrical device to the Kill A Watt. The gadget will track how much power your device consumes. You can measure electrical expenses by the day, week, month, or year, and monitor voltage and line frequency to check the quality of the electrical power.

The readings will provide some insight into which devices in your office are power hogs. Desktop computers, copiers, and fax machines usually are among the most inefficient items, but not always in the way you might think. Some newer desktop computers actually consume more power than older ones because they feature bigger and faster processors. Those added features come at a cost, and the bill arrives every month from the utility company.

Another new tool for tracking your office's overall power consumption comes from the world's most popular search engine company. The free, online Google PowerMeter (www.google.com/powermeter) helps users save energy and money by tapping into the information provided by utilities' wireless smart meters. (So far, San Diego Gas & Electric is the only California utility to sign on, but Google plans to add others.) Then, from any connected browser you can track energy consumption by the day, week, or month.

The Google PowerMeter also monitors "always on" power - the electricity consumed by devices in standby mode. The standby mode, incidentally, is a substantial and often unnecessary power drain, accounting for as much as 10 percent of all wasted energy. So wherever possible, plug your computers and printers into a power strip, and then turn off the entire strip any time you leave the office for an extended period.

Reduce the Paper Chase
Justice is often symbolized as a blindfolded woman holding a perfectly balanced scale. But a more accurate representation of the law might be a man in a three-piece suit cutting down trees with a chain saw. Fact is, the legal profession consumes an astounding amount of paper (and therefore trees). By one estimate, large firms consume as many as 100,000 sheets of paper per attorney every year - a half ton of paper for every lawyer on staff. Timberrrr!

Killing trees is unavoidable in a judicial system that confers greater legal weight to a written document than an oral agreement. But there are several simple ways for firms to significantly reduce their paper consumption. One is to assure that at least 90 percent of all types of paper used - copier, printer, letterhead, envelopes, and bond paper - have at least 30 percent post-consumer recycled content, and then recycle at least 90 percent of the discarded office paper mix. (Those are targets set by the Law Office Climate Challenge WasteWise Program, established by the ABA and the Environmental Protection Agency.)

You can take your paper stewardship much further with the addition of two pieces of equipment: a scanner, and a printer that's equipped to print on both sides of a sheet. With a scanner, you can convert confidential paper documents into electronic PDF files before shredding them for recycling. Some scanners, like the Fujitsu ScanSnap S5100 F (available online for about $430), can digitize both sides of a document in a single pass, boosting efficiency for a small firm or solo practice.

For the times you simply must print out a multipage document, a double-sided (or "duplex") printer can instantly slash your paper consumption in half. Printing on both sides of a page not only saves trees and money, but it also reduces the amount of paper you have to lug around with you to meetings or court dates. Duplex printers used to be expensive, but the prices have come down over the past several years. For instance, the Brother HL-5340D duplex laser printer costs about $190, while the HP Officejet Pro 8000 Wireless Printer with duplex capability can be ordered online for as little as $130 with rebates.

Rethink Computer Power
Whenever computer manufacturers talk about "power," they almost always mean computing power, not the amount of electricity a machine consumes.

But you can strike a reasonable balance between processing power and electricity consumption by purchasing an energy-efficient computer. Look for the Energy Star label when you're shopping, or view a complete list of Energy Star products online (www.energystar .gov). The EPA estimates that if all computers sold in the United States met Energy Star requirements, it would save more than $2 billion each year in energy costs and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by an amount equivalent to removing nearly 3 million vehicles from the roads. Energy Starcompliant computers typically switch the machine into a low-power sleep mode after a designated period of inactivity.

And in general, though laptops tend to cost more up front, they consume considerably less power than even the most efficient desktop. In computing, as with the law, there's no such thing as a free lunch.

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