Power Down for the Planet

I hope you’ve been keeping up with my adventures with Power Down for the Planet! So far, I’ve documented my trips to Microsoft in Seattle and Google in Mountain View. While I was in the Bay Area, I also took a trip to Hewlett-Packard’s offices.

When I first checked in at HP, I was greeted by Saleem Van Groenou, with HP Environmental Sustainability. He gave me a tour of the lobby, which was filled with HP’s newest innovations: laptops, computers, TouchSmart screens! I had an opportunity to play with their latest and greatest computers and laptops, which are super sleek and fast. I know a lot of PC fanatics are super jealous right now.

But it’s not all about speed and flashy looks — HP is incredibly environmentally conscious when designing their products. They call their approach “designing for the environment.” This means they build their products smaller to conserve materials, they continuously work to improve product energy efficiency (one of Climate Savers Computing Initiative’s main focus areas), they use recycled packaging, and they even ship in bulk to cut down on emissions from delivery trucks! From design to delivery, HP is very eco-conscious. Pretty thoughtful, don’t you think?

While I was at HP, I met with Janet Gee, from HP Environmental Sustainability. We’re both big users of social media, so we talked a lot about how she uses social media to promote sustainability initiatives within the company. We also talked about the Power Down campaign, which Janet loves because it reaches out to members of the community who may not realize how easy it is to make a difference. If everyone contributed a little, it would add up to a lot, and it’s up to campaigns like Power Down for the Planet to engage students to take those small steps, like using power management on their computers.

My entire day at HP was awesome, but the Halo meeting was definitely a highlight! Halo is video conferencing taken to the next level, so you actually feel like you’re sitting at the same table as people who are thousands of miles away. Words can’t do the experience justice — check out the picture.

I met with a lot of HP’s environmental brains on Halo, including David Eichberg (he was in Boise, Idaho) who works in Global Programs with HP Environmental Sustainability. David stressed that Halo helps curb emissions by keeping people from flying from one city to another for meetings. We also talked about Power to Change, an HP campaign that encouraged college students to fight against climate change. We discussed the strategies the program used to motivate students and how it relates to Power Down for the Planet. Everyone at the meetings proposed some great ideas for the next Power Down campaign. I can’t wait to share with the planning committee!

All in all, I had a really great time at HP. I was genuinely impressed by their commitment to developing state-of-the-art products that are more eco-friendly. I can’t wait to see what they come up with next.

You can read about more of HP's green initiatives here! There's also a cool gadget on the site called the "Carbon Footprint Calculator". You should definitely check it out!

I really appreciate everyone's support with Power Down for the Planet! Be sure to stay tuned for details from my trip to Intel.

Before you go, here's a video log of my trip to HP!

Talk to you soon!

Jenny