Useful Email Disclaimer

Unlike some email disclaimers, this snippet recently observed in a signature block could actually prove useful:

Please consider the environment – do you really need to print this email?

2 comments

  1. Bogdan Bucur Feb 5

    I think this is a verry good thing to do..
    everyone shoudl consider this

  2. Tihamer Dec 22

    Why exactly is it good for the environment?

    Paper in a landfill does not degrade for hundreds of years. So why wouldn’t printing out all our emails help sequester carbon? After all, trees are a renewable resource. I’ve asked a number of people this question but have never gotten a satisfactory answer, though I suspect it has something to do with the cost of energy/paper/ink cartridges; i.e. there are cheaper ways to do carbon sequestration. (I vote for diamondoid trees; see http://www.nanotech-now.com/columns/?article=486 and http://www.imm.org/Reports/rep043.pdf)

    Keep in mind also that transmitting and storing bits is not free. Generally, transmission costs about a penny per megabyte, while storage costs around $1/gigabyte=1/10 of a penny per megabyte. So, sending a one-megabyte graphics-intensive email to 300 people on a mailing list costs about $3.30 ((1MB * $.01)+(1MB * $.001))* 300), not including labor costs. Meanwhile, sending an ordinary non-graphic email to another individual only costs about $0.000385. If a million people removed their worthless 300-character email disclaimers, at only 20 emails a day per person, we’d save $24,000 of environmental damage per year.

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