James Mills is a web developer in the North East of England and founder of Refresh Teesside »
Mike Hughes is the Head of Business for the Evening Gazette. He will be blogging on all matters of importance to Teesside businesses - and some that are just worth knowing »
Jez Davison, business writer at the Evening Gazette, is a regular blogger on all things business - particularly finance, entrepreneurship and the state of the Teesside economy » 
Karen McLauchlan is the Evening Gazette's deputy business and features editor - with special interest in all things industry, property and arts related » 
Jeremy Middleton is a venture capitalist and the co-founder of FTSE-200 company HomeServe » 
Deloitte, which has 23 offices across the UK including Newcastle, is among the country's leading professional services firms » 
ClimateNE & Climate Change Schools Project support the move to a low-carbon, resilient economy and help businesses avoid risk and realise commercial opportunities. Posts by Jen Atkinson, Krista McKinzey and Harriet Thew » Public consciousness is being raised over the increase in average temperatures across the planet. The debate on man-made contribution versus planetary cycles is still contentious and makes the carbon footprint very much an issue of the moment.
Considering that two thirds of the population drive to work it is not surprising that commuter traffic and ongoing air travel are the largest contributors to air pollution.
Printed paper documents â which are immediately out of date once they are printed â produce a massive amount of waste; as it takes effort, consumes unnecessary paper, printer toner and electricity all adding up to an unintentionally increased carbon footprint. Doing business in the most efficient way with the least amount of waste could have a significant impact to climate change.
Technology can help reduce an organisationâÂÂs carbon footprint whilst saving money in the long term by making processes more efficient and improving communication and travel.
Microsoft SharePoint offers basic web portal and intranet functionality and represents an integrated communication platform. It provides a complete view of the organisation, access to up to date information, efficient knowledge sharing and the possibility of automating business processes. This could effectively reduce the amount of paper involved.
Another example is the creation of Virtual Private Networks (VPN) which can be a cost effective and secure way for different corporations to provide users access to the corporate network and for remote networks to communicate with each other across the Internet. It also allows the implementation of home office workstations reducing the need to commute and provides an opportunity to create a more energy-conscious working environment.
But shouldnâÂÂt we all do a (little) bit to reduce our carbon footprint? So while employers are investigating Virtual Private Networks and the paperless office everybody could reuse a plastic bag, walk instead of drive or use bottles rather than cans to ease the âÂÂgreen conscienceâÂ?.
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