Inkjets & the environment

Stuart Andrews April 9, 2015

Choosing inkjet for your next office printer isn’t just good for your business and its bottom line; it’s also good for the environment. HP’s latest office inkjet printers use less energy and create less waste than equivalent laser printers, and with HP’s commitment to environment-friendly manufacturing and recycling, you can be assured that your organisation is doing its best for the planet.

Using Less Energy

Of course, office laser printers have been growing more energy-efficient for years, and HP has led the way with reductions in operating and standby power consumption, more efficient power-save modes and more effective tools for managing power use across a fleet of printers. All the same, there are parts of the laser printing process that involve significant quantities of energy, most notably the fuser which fuses the particles of toner onto the sheet of paper during printing. This needs to heat up rapidly before the first page can be printed and then be kept hot during printing, usually at temperatures in excess of 200°C.

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Many HP Laser printers now use low-melt toners and/or Instant-on technology to reduce the energy the fuser uses, but Inkjet printers are unquestionably more energy-efficient. An HP Officejet Pro X inkjet printer uses up to 50 per cent less energy than an equivalent laser printer, partly because its PageWide inkjet head requires no fuser. Tested against leading office printers from Samsung and Brother, an HP Officejet Pro X476dw used as little as 66.6 per cent of the power, while an Officejet Pro X576dw used between 69.1 per cent and 88.8 per cent. Extend this over a week, and the HP printers will use less than half the energy of their laser printer rivals; an average 70W while operating, 10W in standby and 4.8W in sleep mode. A typical laser printer may use as much as 380W working and 70W in standby without going to sleep, where consumption might still be 7W.

OfficeJet Pro X printers also come with a robust set of power-management options, which can be configured using the printer control panel, the HP Embedded Web Server interface or the HP Web Jetadmin UI. Just like HP’s laser printers you can set how long your printer has to wait without work before going to sleep, and also set scheduled on and off times. It all adds up to a dramatic reduction in energy consumption, which is as good for the company bank balance as it is for the environment.

Consolidating Printers

Another way HP’s new inkjets can help you reduce your business’s carbon footprint is through consolidation. With speeds of up to 70ppm and monthly workloads up to 4,200 pages, a single Officejet Pro X printer could easily do the work of two or more old laser printers and use up a fraction of their energy. Use duplex printing – as standard with every Officejet Pro X – and you can cut down on paper usage too.

Reducing Waste

All printers produce some waste, whether it’s the toner and imaging drums in a laser printer or the ink cartridges and printheads in an inkjet. Many of us assume that an inkjet wastes more, simply because we’re used to laser toner cartridges that last for several thousand pages and inkjet cartridges that drop out after a few hundred prints or so. When it comes to the Officejet Pro and Officejet Pro X lines, however, you might be in for a surprise. The new XL cartridges used in the Officejet Pro X range, for instance, can print 6,600 pages in the case of each colour cartridge and 9,200 for the black. That’s comparable to many office laser printers.

Throw in Draft and General Office modes that use less ink, separate colour cartridges that can be replaced individually and a printhead and maintenance cartridge that lasts the lifespan of the printer, and Officejet Pro X printers minimise the amount of waste produced. You can even set where the low ink warning kicks in, and ensure that pages being printed while a cartridge runs out will still finish printing. This all stacks up well against comparable laser printers. Combine the spent ink or toner cartridges and the packaging used to print 15,000 pages at 40 per cent coverage, and the Officehet Pro X476sw produces only 50 per cent of the waste produced by some laser models.

Easy Recycling

With HP, of course, waste doesn’t have to mean landfill. With its Planet Partners program HP has led the way when it comes to recycling, with a product return program both for hardware and supplies. In the UK HP recycles HP inkjet and Laserjet cartridges for free, not to mention used printers, laptops, PCs and multi-function devices. You can easily order collection boxes with free pick-up online, or return supplies or hardware to a designated collection point. HP then manages the whole recycling chain, overseeing transport to an authorised sorting and waste facility, where cartridges, printers or computers can be broken down into the raw materials, which will then be used to make new cartridges or other metal and plastic products.

Since 1986 HP has recovered over 1 billion kg of products for reuse and recycling, and produced over 1.5 billion HP Laserjet and inkjet cartridges containing recycled materials. Many of HP’s inkjet cartridges contain over 50 per cent recycled plastics by weight. HP also works hard to ensure that its products are free of hazardous substances, and that the packaging materials are recyclable.

HP is widely recognised for its environmental efforts, ranking highest among electronics companies and fifth overall in Interbrand’s 2011 list of the 50 best global green brands, and coming second in Newsweek’s list of the 500 greenest US companies. HP has had ISO 14001 certification – the international standard for environmental management systems – since June 2000. Choosing an inkjet as an office printer can help any business go greener, reducing energy costs and environmental impact. Choosing HP inkjets takes that up to the next level, making it a smart choice for any responsible business.

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