The Environmental Protection Agency's ENERGY STAR program has pushed the "million monitor" campaign to get businesses, universities and governmental agencies to agree to power down computers when not in use.
Danny Orlando, with EPA's regional office in Atlanta, said companies can save up to $55 per computer by having the monitors automatically power down when not in use.
Power management features are standard on both Windows and Macintosh operating systems, but they are not always used, according to Orlando.
The EPA's Atlanta office estimates it will save about $24,500 per year in energy costs by making sure its 1,000 or so computers automatically go into a low-power sleep mode when they're not in use. In terms of energy, Orlando said the move will save enough energy to power 330 households for one month. In terms of emissions, that's 240 tons of carbon dioxide emissions.
Using software called EZ Save developed jointly by the EPA and U.S. Department of Energy, companies with large computer systems can determine which computers in their network are using the power management feature and activate the feature for the network.
For more information, go to www.energystar.gov
