Reducing the digital carbon footprint in everyday life

There are several ways we can reduce our digital carbon footprint in our daily lives. The sources offer us the following tips:

Changing your streaming and downloading habits:

• Avoid streaming, autoplay, and playing videos when you're not in the room. This is an easy way to save energy, similar to turning off the lights when you leave a room.
• Download content instead of streaming. If you download your favorite series from MAX or Netflix, you'll only use your device's power to watch it, not the power needed to run the streaming service. A faster internet connection when downloading episodes or series increases convenience, saves time and provides a better overall viewing experience by reducing buffering and ensuring high-quality content.

Editing online shopping:

• Close browser tabs and do not leave items in online carts that you are not interested in. Every opened card and item in the cart consumes energy on the servers.

Effective search:

• Delete cookies and search history regularly. This will prevent your online behavior from being tracked and reduce power consumption.
• Reuse searches. The browser thus loads the results from the cache and does not use energy for a new search.

Device settings:

• Adjust power consumption settings. Reduce brightness, set a shorter sleep time, and other settings that affect power consumption.
• Decrease the screen brightness. This will not only reduce power consumption but also extend the battery life of your device.
• Turn off devices when not in use. Sleep mode still consumes power, so it is better to turn off the devices completely.

Electronic waste:

• Recycle, upcycle and responsibly dispose of old devices. Don't throw old phones and computers in the trash, but hand them in for recycling.
• Do not upgrade devices until absolutely necessary. Waiting to upgrade reduces the demand for consumer electronics and has a positive impact on your digital carbon footprint.

Email:

• Change your email settings. Remove images from signature and turn off automatic download of attachments and images.
• Write emails thoughtfully. Delete old emails, unsubscribe from unnecessary lists and minimize the use of images and animations.

Other tips:

• Limit your screen time and spend more time outside.
• Use ecological light bulbs.
• Clean up your cloud storage. Delete unnecessary files and consider moving archived files to an external hard drive.
• Find a smart app to help you monitor your carbon footprint.

Sources also emphasize the importance of switching to sustainable and renewable energy sources, such as solar panels, heat pumps and hybrid solar and wind energy systems.

In addition to individual steps is important require companies to have carbon-neutral supply chains. Companies like Apple are already working to achieve this goal by 2030.

Remember that even small changes in everyday life can have a big impact on reducing our digital carbon footprint and protecting the environment. Spring