The modern day survival in the 21st Century is dominated by a faster tunnel of life where many people are working to ensure their prosperity. Buried in this equation of seeking livelihoods lies the workplace where many people spend a significant portion of their lives.
According to Kassandra Vaughn, an individual spends an average of 90000 hours of their lifetime in the workplace and this is about one third of our time. Therefore a lot of time is spend in the workplace. We must not neglect the greening of the workplace. The workplace is also filled with major environmental issues that require proper management.
Lots of ideas can be adopted towards greening the workplace and these range from using natural lighting where possible during the day instead of using light unnecessarily. The printing of emails is not always necessary as it results in unnecessary paper usage and generation of waste. Many companies are moving towards paperless systems to eliminate high paper usage. Creative ideas can be made in the management of waste including waste segregation at workplaces. Workplaces today should be designed in a manner that allows waste to be disposed in an environmentally sound manner. After all, a clean work environment presents a great springboard for generating good ideas. Energy efficiency can also be implemented in the workplace through measures such as installing energy efficient lighting as well as switching off gadgets not in use.
What would be the impact if we prioritised greening the workplace? Considering sustainability when making purchasing decisions is a low hanging fruit to greening the workplace. When companies make purchases, there is a very high likelihood of inheriting environmental problems from the supply chain. It is therefore necessary to start looking at the environmental impact of a product before purchasing it.
