Are You Looking For The Best Value For Your Group?
Saturday, September 3rd, 2011
Power Purchasing brings you extraordinary savings on products you use every day. Our relationship with Office Depot allows us to provide YOU with exclusive Office Depot discounts! See below for a few examples of how you can save today!
Your Power Purchasing Login and password will take you directly to these and thousands of other savings available to you EVERY SINGLE DAY.
- Office Storage
- USB Flash Drive
- Scan Disk Memory Card
- Copy/Print Services
Want to Have Access to Office Depot Discounts?
Sign up today and save on products and services including Office Supplies & Furniture, Credit Card Processing and Point of Sale Systems, Uniforms & Logo Apparel, Promotional Products, Technology Products, and Custom Printing Services. With your Power Purchasing savings program, you can begin to take advantage of all the benefits group buying websites have to offer! Register here today!
How To Go Green Tip #7: Use Energy Star Products
Saturday, September 3rd, 2011
Energy Star© will help you more easily navigate your path to “green-dom”! It will help you distinguish products that are truly energy efficient, thus conserving valuable resources and saving you money.
Energy Star© is an international standard for energy efficient consumer products originated in the United States of America. The Energy Star© program was created in the early 1990s. It is a joint program of the United States Environmental Protection Agency and the United States Department of Energy that helps us reduce energy consumption, protect the environment, and save money through energy efficient products and practices. There are many devices which carry the Energy Star logo, such as:
- Computer products and peripherals
- Kitchen appliances
- Buildings
- Other products
These products generally use 20-30% LESS energy than is required by federal standards. Energy efficient choices can save you about a third on your energy bill, and can also reduce about this much on greenhouse gas emissions. These products do not sacrifice features, style or comfort.
Here are some ways you can use Energy Star to help with your Green initiative for your home:
- If you are looking for new household products, look for ones that have earned the ENERGY STAR©. They meet strict energy efficiency guidelines set by the EPA and US Department of Energy.
- If looking for a new home, look for one that has earned the ENERGY STAR©.
- If you’re looking to make larger improvements to your home, EPA offers tools and resources to help you plan and undertake projects to reduce your energy bills and improve home comfort.
For your business:
EPA provides an innovative energy performance rating system which businesses have already used for more than 130,000 buildings across the country. EPA also recognizes top performing buildings with the ENERGY STAR©.
It’s important to shop for Energy Star© certified products, and you can SAVE on these items with Power Purchasing! With your free, customized savings program, you can take advantage of great deals and discounts from top retailers. We’ve negotiated permanent deals with Office Depot©, ADP©, FirstData©, and more! Register for FREE and start saving today!
How To Go Green Tip #6: Use Smart Power Strips
Saturday, September 3rd, 2011
The US Department of Energy states that 75% of electricity used to power home electronics is consumed while the products were turned off. You can save energy and money by unplugging the electronics completely when they’re not in use. Or, consider purchasing smart power strips to turn off electronics, which can also help you be green and save green!
Did you know that computer peripherals, like printers and scanners, continue to use energy, even after you turn them off? It’s called idle current, and whether or not you’re using your peripherals, you’re still paying money and using energy to power them.
Ideally, you should unplug these when they’re not in use. However, anyone who has used a power strip for a cubicle or home office is aware of the tangle of wires it can create. Sometimes, it is not so easy to just unplug some of these computer accessories, (i.e. printers and scanners) but leave others, such as a router, plugged in. Smart power strips can help stop the idle current drawn from your outlets when electronics aren’t in use. So, how does it do this?
Basically, with certain marked outlets, it monitors power consumption and can sense the difference between when computers and other devices are on or off. Upon figuring this out, it shuts off the power, eliminating the idle current drawn from them.
If you leave everything on:
By using a simple computer script combined with the Smart Strip Power Strip in an office environment where the computers are left on 24/7, the computer would shut off at the end of the day or if it is not used for 1 hour (user/administer programmable). Then, the computer and its peripherals would be on only 9 hours, 5 days a week. This results in a 73% power savings on the power used by the office computer system.
If you leave just your peripherals on:
Most computer systems now have at least a monitor, scanner, printer, DSL/Cable modem and a USB hub. While the computer is turned off, each peripheral still draws an idle current of 50 mA to 400 mA per hour. Multiply that by the number of peripherals you have, and the number of hours you leave them plugged in (usually 24/7), and you can see how that ‘idle current’ can really add up on your bill! Smart power strips can eliminate this. Even if you shut everything off each day, you may still appreciate the benefits from using a smart power strip, such as:
- No need to wait for the computer to turn off.
- No need to turn off your power strip.
- All peripherals that do not have a power switch can be easily, automatically turned off.
- No leakage current. Even if the device that they are attached to is turned off, a transformer has a leakage current of more than 4 watts, while a smart power strip prevents any leakage.10 Ways to Go Green While Saving Green 231×300 #6 Use Smart Power Strips to Prevent Idle Current
In addition to using smart power strips to save you money on your electrical bill, we will teach you ways in which you can purchase energy efficient technology products that have earned the Energy Star Certification in our next blog post.
If you’re looking to get discounts and save money on all types of products for your association or business, you’ve come to the right place! With your Power Purchasing savings program, you can have discounts from top retailers like Office Depot©, FirstData©, ADP©, and more! Register for FREE to start saving today!
How To Go Green Tip #5: Switch to Fluorescent Lights
Saturday, September 3rd, 2011
The best way to save energy and money is to turn off the lights! However, if you’re not a fan of working in the dark, here’s a way to reduce your use of energy and save money at the same time.
Switch to compact fluorescent lights. They use two-thirds the amount of energy as regular bulbs and they last up to 10 times longer. It’s recommended by the Environmental Protection Agency!
How Does a Fluorescent Light Save Money?
A “normal light bulb”, also known as an incandescent light bulb, has a very thin tungsten filament inside a glass sphere. It comes in sizes like “60 watt,” “75 watt,” “100 watt”, etc.
Basically, electricity runs through the filament of the bulb. Because the filament is so thin, it offers resistance to the electricity, and this resistance turns electrical energy into heat. The heat is enough to make the filament white hot, and the “white” part is light. The filament glows because of the heat — in other words, it “incandesces”.
With incandescent light bulbs, the heat wastes a lot of electricity. Heat is not light, and the purpose of the light bulb is light, so all of the energy spent creating heat is a waste. Incandescent bulbs are therefore very inefficient. They produce perhaps 15 “lumens” (a measurement of light) per watt of input.
Fluorescent lights use a completely different method to produce light. There are electrodes at both ends of a fluorescent tube and a gas containing argon and mercury vapor within the tube. The electrons interact with mercury vapor atoms floating inside the bulb.The mercury atoms become excited, and when they return to an unexcited state they release photons of light in the ultraviolet region of the spectrum.
These ultraviolet photons collide with the phosphor coating on the inside of the bulb, and the phosphor creates visible light.
The phosphor fluoresces to produce light.
Because a fluorescent bulb produces less heat, it is much more efficient. A fluorescent bulb can produce between 50 and 100 lumens per watt! This makes fluorescent lights four to six times more efficient than incandescent lights. Therefore, less energy is used, so you conserve environmental resources and you save money on your electric bill!
Save On Office Lighting With Power Purchasing!
When you sign up for a FREE Power Purchasing savings program, you can save money on items (like new fluorescent lights) that you use every day! We have permanent discounts negotiated with top retailers such as Office Depot©, ADP©, Copy & Print Depot©, FirstData©, and more! Register today to start saving!
How To Go Green Tip #4: Recycle Toner Cartridges
Saturday, September 3rd, 2011Approximately 97% of the combined components in toners (plastic, metal, rubber, paper, foam, and toner) can be recycled. Now, here’s the scary part…
If toners are NOT recycled, the plastic, made of engineering- grade polymers, takes at least 1,000 years to decompose!
Currently, as many as 60 million “all-in-one” toner cartridges are bought annually in the U.S. Worldwide, 150 million per year. Combine that with 400 million inkjet cartridges and you can begin to imagine the amount of waste generated from cartridges that don’t get recycled.
Start a Going Green Trend!
Unfortunately, only 25% of toner cartridges purchased are getting recycled and remanufactured. So, it’s time to start a trend and lead by example!
When you recycle toner cartridges, you are helping to keep non-biodegradable material, such as plastic, steel, aluminum, and rubber out of landfills. You are also conserving the equivalent of three quarts of oil per cartridge!
Plastic is an environmental hazard and its use should be minimized. It takes many years to decompose and is already an environmental concern in many countries. The recycling of toner cartridges will save thousands of tons of metal and plastic from getting into landfills.
Here is the best part: Office Depot provides FREE return boxes for your empty cartridges and picks them up from your office. Furthermore, for every empty toner/ink cartridge returned to an Office Depot store, you receive a $2 credit to your Rewards Card which can be used like cash when you shop at the store or online. How simple is that to do the right thing?
Should you decide to return your toner cartridges to an Office Depot Store, don’t forget to bring your Power Purchasing Card. This card will enable you to get unbeatable savings when shopping in-store! Want to start saving today? Sign up with Power Purchasing today and receive FREE discounts all year long!
How To Go Green Tip #3: Use Remanufactured Toners
Saturday, September 3rd, 2011
Another super easy way to begin your “going green” initiative is to use remanufactured toners whenever possible. This doesn’t require any additional effort, it will help save the environment and will definitely save you some green! In fact, the difference in price when using remanufactured vs original equipment manufacturer’s cartridges (OEM) is 45%!
Remanufactured toners:
- Minimize the disposal of these materials
- Conserve natural resources by eliminating the need for virgin materials
- Save energy in the remanufacturing process
Remanufactured toners and inkjet cartridges offer advantages over new cartridges in cost, waste reduction, and sometimes even in product quality. Our sources fill, inspect and test each of their products, greatly improving the paper yield and quality. You’re getting the same product, protecting the environment and saving some green. There are some common misperceptions about using remanufactured toners, so just to clarify:
Remanufacturers DO NOT just replace the toner in the cartridges.
Professional remanufacturers replace every worn or damaged component in the cartridges. Imaging Drums (OPC Drums), the most critical components for quality performance, are cleaned, tested or usually replaced.
Remanufacturers DO NOT reuse Toner in their cartridges.
If they did, then none of the cartridges would work! Toner becomes contaminated during the printing process by paper dust and electrical charges rendering it unusable. Every different Manufacturer’s cartridge model also requires different toner formulation. Combining contaminated toners would compound problems.
Defective Toner cartridges DO NOT damage printers.
Properly remanufactured cartridges do not damage printers or create more wear than cartridges that are properly assembled by or for printer makers. Removing toner deposits is often part of routine maintenance for the printer.
Remanufactured cartridges are NOT inferior to manufacturer originals.
There is no difference in quality or printed output between the OEM cartridges and a remanufactured cartridge. However, there are significant savings in price and a significant benefit to the environment. In addition to the regular savings for using remanufactured cartridges, Power Purchasing offers additional discounts on over 40 of the most popular ink and toner cartridges!
Use of Remanufactured Cartridges will NOT void your Printer Warranty.
According to the American fair trade laws, the original equipment manufacturers are not allowed to void your printer warranty for using compatible or remanufactured toner or ink cartridges. HP even has this information very clearly displayed on their website.
If you’re still paying top dollar for printer cartridges and toner, STOP! You’re robbing your own business by not realizing the savings that you could have by easily joining Power Purchasing and receiving a customized savings program. With our savings programs, you can receive discounts on office supplies, uniforms and logo apparel, promotional products, payroll services, and more!
Sign up now to start saving today!
How To Go Green Tip #2: Recycle Paper
Saturday, September 3rd, 2011
Did you know that American’s discard 4 million TONS of office paper every year? Recycling just one stack of paper about 6 feet tall can save the life of a 35 foot tall tree that has taken many years to grow.
For every sheet of new paper used, trees must be destroyed. Trees are among the world’s most valuable resources and loss of these trees can result in the loss of precious wildlife’s habitat. Trees take years to grow, while paper is usually tossed away after quick use. However, we can easily prevent this loss of trees by something as simple as recycling paper.
Going green can be done in a few simple steps – all it takes is for you to dispose of your paper into the recycling bin as opposed to the trash can. This will help you to:
- Save our valuable natural resources
- Save energy
- Save our trees
- Create less toxic bi-products
- Add less waste to our over-crowded landfills
In the United States, the Environmental Protection Agency has found that recycling paper causes 35% less water pollution and 74% less air pollution. So, now that you see the benefits, one of the first steps to your green initiative should be recycling paper whenever possible (see the impact of your paper use).
To assist you with your efforts to go green while saving green, Power Purchasing members receive lower contract pricing on printer paper with the following certifications:
- Sustainable Forestry Initiative
- Forest Stewardship Council
- GreenSeal®
On a side note, did you know that you can get your first year’s membership for FREE when you join the PowerAdvantageTM Program? With your Power Purchasing savings program, you’ll also have access to Office Depot® discounts, ADP® Payroll Services discounts, and more! Sign up today!
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