MARCH 2008: BIZ LIFE, HELP DESK
Make your gathering greener
Companies today know the importance of presenting a green face
to their customers, but what goes on in the boardroom itself
isn’t always so environmentally friendly. Business
meetings and events can gobble up a surprising amount of
resources and produce mounds of waste. A few simple,
eco-conscious changes, however, can make a big difference.
Cynthia Fuhrman, communications manager for the Portland
Office of Sustainable Development, and Amy Spatrisano, a
principal at Portland-based Meeting Strategies Worldwide and
co-author of Simple Steps to
Green Meetings and Events, have some suggestions to make
your gathering a little greener.
1. Reduce where you
can, Spatrisano suggests. Instead of providing handouts to
everyone at a meeting, project a PowerPoint presentation on the
wall or write important points on a whiteboard. After the
meeting, highlights can be e-mailed to attendees to save
paper.
2. Where you
can’t reduce, reuse. If snacks are on the meeting agenda,
forget the disposable plates and utensils. “It takes 10
times more energy and natural resources to produce 1,000
plastic forks than to wash a metal fork 1,000 times,”
Spatrisano says. If any food is left over, compost or donate it
to charity.
3. “If you are
using materials that are not reusable, make sure that they are
recyclable,” Fuhrman says. Have separation bins on hand
and make sure they’re used. Also, look for products
already made from recycled materials.
4. If it’s
necessary to go offsite, do some research before committing to
a location for your meeting or event. Consider the geographic
location of attendees to reduce travel distances, and ask
around to see which venues follow environmentally responsible
practices. Some hotels, for example, save water by only washing
towels and bed linens by guest request.
5. Using local food,
labor and products reduces shipping and, therefore, carbon
emissions. If products and attendees are coming from out of
town, Fuhrman suggests purchasing energy offset credits to
reduce the net impact of your event.
JAMIE HARTFORD
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