Printers and the Environment

I have previously published a post Digi D' House: An almost paperless office (click BACK button to get back to this page). Please note the phrase almost paperless. While most of the communications intra-staff and between staff and others are done via mobile phone calls, emails, etc., and documents are sent as paperless attachments, they still had to have a central printer to print hard copies that means paper plus toner.

There are many printer manufacturers plus different types of printers. Among the many printer manufacturers, I know that Canon, have an environmental program as you can check for yourself at Canon Environmental Activities. HP too have a printer cartridge recycling program as seen from Original HP printing supplies — environmentally sound. As for myself, Enviroman, I have a laser printer but try to avoid using it as far as I can. An example, I have Cute PDF printer installed plus uses online banking plus other online transactions. When I need to print receipts, I use Cute PDF printer to "print" digital receipts.

However, there is no escape from hard copies (paper). My son sometimes needs to print hard copies of his assignments. I have to print hard copies of receipts for Income Tax purposes. So it is impossible not to have a printer, in the above "almost paperless office" and my "almost paperless home".

However, I think that whenever we are in the market for a printer, we should look for printer reviews. Since both Canon and HP have some kind of environmental programs, I think we should try to confine our search for a Canon Printers or a Hewlett Packard Printers.

By the way, my printer happened to be a Canon printer - the Canon Laser Shot LBP300 laser printer.