Newspapers Pollute Less On E-Readers and Tablets

bobwyman writes "It seems counter-intuitive but a RAND full lifecycle analysis (PDF) shows that reading news electronically produces fewer GHG emissions than reading news on paper: 'Adopting e-readers could reduce GHG emissions from publishing and distributing newspapers by 74 percent; using tablet computers could result in a 63 percent reduction, assuming that all the GHG emissions associated with producing and operating e-readers or tablet computers are ascribed to reading newspapers. If a more realistic assumption is adopted, that the emissions associated with these devices should be spread across other activities pursued on these devices, the difference would be on the order of 84 to 89 percent less, respectively.'"

Comments

Counter-intuitive

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

"It seems counter-intuitive but a RAND full lifecycle analysis (PDF) shows that reading news electronically produces fewer GHG emissions than reading news on paper:

How is this in any way counter-intuitive?

Re:Counter-intuitive

[Troyusrex]

My thought exactly. It's a lot less energy to push electrons than to push newspaper trucks.

Re:Counter-intuitive

[betterunixthanunix]

Producing semiconductors is a fairly energy-intensive process, tablets are full of semiconductors -- chips, the screen, etc. I can believe, though, that if a tablet is used instead of a printed newspaper every day for 2 or so years, there is a net energy savings.

Re:Counter-intuitive

[pla]

How is this in any way counter-intuitive?

This.

I realize that semiconductor manufacturing has its own set of associated evils, but seriously? Did we actually have any doubt whatsoever that somewhere on the order of 500-2500 newspapers would damage the environment less to view them electronically than by cutting down the sole significant organic CO2 sink known to man, transporting them, bleaching them, drying them, transporting them again, pulping them, bleaching again, transporting them again, milling into paper, transporting them again, printing on them with hydrocarbon inks, and transporting yet one more time, a dead-tree edition of the Daily?

Okay, a single day's run, we might have a toss-up, conceptually. But over the life of the device? Seriously?

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However

[rossdee]

They still take as many green pieces of paper to subscribe to

Yes whats with the conspiracy theories?

[arcite]

Just think of the forests that are chopped down, pulp mills powered by coal to process the pulp, the millions of liters of water used to process the pulp, millions of liters of chemicals to bleach the paper, and finally the tens of thousands of trucks and even ships used to transport the paper to the printers....then of course the printers are on industrial scale all in themselves. A world of tablets, which should become smaller, more powerful, more environmentally friendly over time, could save many forests.