In Honor of Earth Day this also leads me into this article on: Paperless Living.  As a society, we pretty much hit the print button immediately for just about anything.   I’ll be honest, and say I’ve been guilty of it.  However, I’ve found most of the time I never look for the paper again (or can even find it).  Over time and with some advances in computing, there are some ways that you can cut down on wasting paper.

Printing and the Conservation of Trees

The benefits of cutting down on printing and paper:

• Lower cost of ink replacement
• Lower cost of paper replacement
• Less wear and tear on hardware
• Low Environmental impact

Paper Conservation Tips

• Emails: I use Gmail and rarely print out attachments and emails.  Just archive them in there.  Then search for them in the search box later on.  You wont be needing most email printed out, like you may think.
• Print-to-File: There are some programs that you can download and install, that will add a virtual “printer” to your computer.  The most popular one is using Adobe Acrobat Standard 9 , and selecting Adobe PDF as your printer.  It will ask you where to save the file, then you choose where you want it saved.  It will save it in a PDF format to reference later in the same look and feel as the original.  Then of course you can backup any of these files.  Another option is Microsoft Office Professional 2007 .mdi or .doc format that saves it in black & white.   I cover this in more depth in my article: Benefits of Using PDF
• Cheap Ink Printer: Kodak has been touting some low-cost ownership printers meaning low cost of ink.  Did you know printer ink is the most expensive liquid on the planet, beating out even Oil?  Kodak has it’s new line of EasyShare Printers that feature ink cartridges at approximately 9 dollars.  If you’re going to print something you may as well save some cash in the meantime and also print your photos at home for cheap.  Better then the major photo printeries disposing of the developing liquids.
• Digital Subscription Services: See below, where I outline some digital based newspaper and magazine options.
• Paperless Statements: All your bank accounts and credit cards can probably be accessed online.  Furthermore, you should sign-up for Paperless Statements off all your accounts.  Imagine all the tree’s we can save if everyone signed up for paperless statements!
• Schools and Companies: I found this article on ZDnet that explained how paperless computing in a school environment is a cost-effective solution.  You should check it out!

Shift in Thinking

Basically, a few of you knew these options existed but never thought to use them.  They are simple, but the hard part is shifting your thinking and perception of the importance of printing.  Really sit down and think about how often you refer back or search for printed documents. Thought about it?  Well, I’ll bet – Not very often.

Besides instead of wasting time searching for paper documents, you could be just searching for it on your computer.  Guess which one will go faster?  You betcha – the computer.

Document Management Software

In a few months I’ll probably get to try out some Business end solutions such as DocuShare from Xerox.  Their particular software allows you to manage documents from the PC as well as from any printer, and send documents in a “work flow” to other printers/PC’s for processing.  I’ll probably report on that when the time comes. 

One piece of software I found online for small business or individuals that should work is File Professional Document Management Software

Saving New Documents and Scanning Old Documents

Basically, if you start your paperless life today all you’ll have to do is save all incoming content and new content you generated right on your computer.  What about old documents, files, photos, etc?  Well, all that can be logged in and indexed with the use of a commercial scanner.

Backup your Document Library!

Of course more important is to backup all your files, otherwise, what is the sense in saving them?  If we’re going to stop cluttering everything with paper – we need a reliable retrieval and backup method.  I’ll be outlining in a future article on how general backups can be performed.

Digital Subscriptions & Devices

Lately, I’ve strayed from reading my typical slick magazines and opted for Digital Magazines.  It’s just as informative and eye-candyish as the real deal – plus, you get the interactive elements such as hyperlinks.  If you read magazines or newspapers, you should try to convert over to digital subscription services.

Here is some starter ideas for reading digitally!

Magazines:  You can get magazines delivered digitally – Personally, I use Zinio subscription services and like it.

Newspapers: You can get most any newspaper you want digitally now by email or by device.

Books: You can purchase books online digital or have them automatically downloaded to a device.  If I could afford one, I’d be touting a Kindle 2: Amazon’s New Wireless Reading Device (Latest Generation) .  This has received RAVE reviews for their digital ink technology and ease of downloading full books and newspapers.

The Challenge

I challenge each and every one of my readers to try and follow the below steps and carry it out for at least a couple weeks to reduce your environmental impact (or develop your own and report back)!  Let me know how you do!

Step 1 – Acquire the software or devices as mentioned above

Step 2 – At minimum Create a directory in your My Documents for “Paper Archives”, by the month/year.  Save all PDF/MDI/Documents in these directories.

Step 3 – Save/archive all emails in Hotmail, Gmail, Yahoo, Outlook, etc.  Search them if you need a file or email reference.

Step 4 – Do these things for at least two weeks.

Step 5 – Report your Results here and Ask yourself:  Was that hard? and Can I compute like this for a long term?  If so, great!  Please continue and let us know here at TftM of your results and further suggestions!

Useful Items Cited in this Article:

Related Blog’s on the Topic: Living the Frugal Life – Paperless – 5 Green-Tech Ways to use less paper – Earthly Ideas