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The thought of wanting to be eco-friendly is definitely a noble one to have. Out of the top of my head, here is a list of little somethings you can do, as a programmer and otherwise, to contribute your part:
- Write your code efficiently. As a programmer, there’s a high chance that you are bound to end at a place where your code will reach millions of users. Writing efficient code, say for instance, optimising the number of API calls that it takes to get to a view, will have a significant impact. Keep yourself educated, on what you can do to improve yourself in writing performant, efficient code.
Articles like these — Optimise ES6 Output Size & Performance by @grgur — are awesome. Being sensitive to your users’ bandwidth is not only a + to them, but also to the environment.
- Be biased towards hosting providers who have their servers hosted in green data centers. Do read this — How a green datacenter affects your website
- Ride a bicycle to work. 🚴 Or use public transport. Kudos to @alkshendra @fazlerocks, @somu, and @sandeep; all of them ride a bike to work.
- Base your decisions on data. This! Take for instance the argument — “everyone should go paperless for the betterment of the environment”. How true is the argument though! Always argue with facts. Have you counted in the the energy expenditure factor of the digital devices?
Take the study done at the KTH Center for Sustainable Communications, for instance.
It looked specifically at reading the daily news in print, on a computer, and on an e-reader. It factored in different mixes of energy used to produce and consume the news as well as the differences in materials needed for printed versus digital versions. It also examined how much time was spent reading them. All of these factors can significantly change the environmental impact of news reading.
The study found that if you live someplace that produces its electricity similarly to the European average (that is, slightly greener overall than the U.S. average), and you spend just 10 minutes a day reading the news, then reading online or with an e-reader produces less of an environmental impact, measured in terms of carbon emissions.
- And finally, stay informed. It is great to do your part, but what is greater, IMO, is to support the people who’re already at it. One way you could do this is to stay informed on everything they do, and spread the word about all the awesome stuff they’re doing. I love Tesla. Tesla is going to change the world!