Managing Computer Use for Energy Efficiency

The most effective ways to reduce your computer’s energy use is by adjusting power management settings or by selecting efficient components during its purchase. Conversely, minimizing or closing background applications will have almost no effect on the amount of energy used by your computer.

However, the idle mode—where a computer is switched on but waiting to perform tasks—does present a significant savings opportunity because it’s responsible for over 90 percent of a computer’s energy use. Energy use in the idle mode can be reduced by purchasing power supplies, motherboards, case fans, memory modules, and hard drives that are more efficient than standard components as well as choosing the right size of power supplies and fans.

Other opportunities also exist for reducing computer energy use, such as:

• Adjusting the power management settings or simply turning off the computer and its peripherals when not in use can save more than 50 percent, although these savings depend on behavior. Look for Power Options under your computer’s Control Panel menu to manage its power saving features.

• Selecting IT equipment that carries the Energy Star label and ensuring that the energy savings features are enabled

• Using liquid-crystal-display (LCD) monitors instead of cathode-ray-tube (CRT) models,

• Opting for a laptop instead of a desktop model (laptops are designed to use less energy than desktops in order to extend battery life).