Shopping Green
Shopping for your next green upgrade can be easy if you know what to look for. There are numerous “green” labels out there and more being defined every day. You should be familiar with the most common marks and what each means.
ENERGY STAR helps you make more energy efficient choices.
- If looking for new household products, look for ones that have earned the ENERGY STAR. They meet strict energy efficiency guidelines set by the EPA and US Department of Energy.
- If looking for a new home, look for one that has earned the ENERGY STAR.
- If looking to make larger improvements to your home, EPA offers tools and resources to help you plan and undertake projects to reduce your energy bills and improve home comfort.
EPA provides an innovative energy performance rating system which businesses have already used for more than 62,000 buildings across the country.
EPA also recognizes top performing buildings with the ENERGY STAR.
80 PLUS is an innovative, electric utility-funded incentive program to integrate more energy-efficient power supplies into desktop computers and servers. Participating utilities and energy efficiency organizations across North America have contributed over $5 million of incentives to help the computer industry transition to 80 PLUS certified power supplies.
The 80 PLUS performance specification requires power supplies in computers and servers to be 80% or greater energy efficient at 20%, 50% and 100% of rated load with a true power factor of 0.9 or greater. This makes an
80 PLUS certified power supply substantially more efficient than typical power supplies and creates a unique market differentiation opportunity for power supply and computer manufacturers.
EPEAT is a system to help purchasers in the public and private sectors evaluate, compare and select desktop computers, notebooks and monitors based on their environmental attributes. EPEAT also provides a clear and consistent set of performance criteria for the design of products, and provides an opportunity for manufacturers to secure market recognition for efforts to reduce the environmental impact of its products.
RoHS covers everything in a computer except the batteries. This directive bans from the EU market any new electronic or electrical equipment containing more than the mandated levels of Lead and other toxic materials.
