Xerox sustainability calculator delivers environmental metrics

In late March 2008, Xerox released a "sustainability calculator" to help offices gauge the environmental impact of their printing and paper usage and determine the environmental benefits that could be achieved by changing company practices. The tool is part of Xerox Office Services and is used by the company's consultants to better help customers to make decisions and provide them with metrics that can be used in environmental reports. While Xerox touts the tool as the first of its kind, the more newsworthy part of the announcement is the motivation behind the creation of the tool.

"I have been conducting roundtable discussions about environmental impacts with managers and IT director for years, and I've always had to make the business case," says Patty Calkins, vice president of environment, health and safety at Xerox. "Recently, for the first time ever, they began saying 'Yeah, yeah, yeah, we know the business case; we need numbers on the environmental benefits so we can use that in our reports and marketing materials.' It's a massive shift."

In addition to providing reportable metrics to customers, the calculator is now part of Xerox consultants' office-optimization process. According to Calkins, in the typical office, printers, fax machines and scanners sit idle 98 percent of the time -- but they are still drawing power, and they still have to be serviced and maintained. If equipment is older, which Calkins says is quite often the case, it is also less energy efficient. Xerox Office Services team advises customers to get rid of underutilized and older devices, replace single-function devices with multi-function devices, get appropriately sized office equipment, and generally optimize office equipment around business processes.

"We help them optimize their office, and have always shown them how that reduces the cost of their print processes, but now customers are coming to us saying 'we have certain sustainability goals and we want to be able to track our improvement as we move towards a more optimized office environment,' " Calkins says, adding that customers are increasingly concerned with communicating their sustainability progress to employees, stakeholders and customers.

Xerox (NYSE: XRX) has also begun replacing the toner in its machines with what Calkins calls emulsion aggregation toners.Traditional toners are made with polymers that are mechanically ground down into a powder, she explains. Not only does the grinding require a lot of energy, but the toner particles are irregular shapes and sizes, which means the printers have to put more toner on paper in the printing process to ensure even coverage, Calkins says.

With the emulsion aggregation toners, the grinding process is eliminated, and the toner is created in the manufacturing process to uniform size and shape. Calkins says the toner requires 25 percent less energy to manufacture, and uniformity results in a 40 to 45 percent reduction in the amount of toner needed per print. Also, because there is less toner to be fused to paper in the printing process, fusing requires less heat, which results in further energy benefits.

Unfortunately, the emulsion toners are not a drop-in replacement for Xerox machines, but the company is redesigning its products around the new toners and has begun replacing older printers with new machines equipped with the new toner technology.