Shutting down PCs at night has long been cited as a good way for businesses to reduce carbon emissions, but new research has suggested that companies are not doing as well as their workers in this respect.
The research was carried out by PC power management firm Verismic and found that over half (56%) of the respondents took some steps to reduce power usage at the end of the working day, whether it was turning off their PC completely (48% of respondents) or putting the computer into standby mode (8%).
Of those who do shut their computer down just 44% do so because it is company policy. Nearly half (49%) said it is because they are worried about how much energy it uses. Verismic CEO Ashley Leonard said this suggests workers are doing a better job of caring about energy use than their employers.
In fact the research revealed that the vast majority of workers (91%) care about how much their employer spends on energy at work. However just 49% said they worried about energy use and 50% said they want to conserve power at the office in the same way they do at home.
At a panel discussion held to discuss the results of the findings Jean Ritchie, former service director of the data compute facility at the University of Edinburgh, said this discrepancy could be because many workers think their employer is already taking appropriate steps to limit energy usage or they possibly felt there was nothing they could do.
However Mark Bailey, a partner at Speechly Bircham law firm, told CBR that the difference could be because workers are worried that overspending on energy could cause budgets to be cut in other departments and possibly even put jobs at risk.
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One-quarter of respondents (24%) said they take no measure at all to reduce energy by switching off their PCs at night. A combination of forgetting to do so (22%) and inconvenience (66%) was blamed. Inconveniences included the PC taking too long to start the following morning (44%) and the time it takes to shut down compared to simply locking the screen (22%).
"By tuning in a little better to their employees attitudes to the energy costs they use at work, companies could really harness what seems to be a need to conserve and be governed. Employees seem to want to be secure in knowing that their PC or laptop is using minimum resources but available and working whenever required," said Leonard.
