So says an article in Stuff from New Zealand.
A study by United States research and media firm Cleantech Group found carbon emissions from electronic books were far lower than from traditional book publishing. On average, the carbon emitted in the lifecycle of an Amazon Kindle e-reader would be fully offset after the first year of use, and any additional years of use would result in net carbon savings of about 168 kilograms of carbon dioxide a year, it said. That assumed people would otherwise buy 22 new books a year.
However, the study found e-readers were not squeaky clean. Production of a Kindle created 168kg of carbon dioxide compared with 7.46kg for a book. But e-readers also require electricity to run and are not as environmentally friendly to dispose of as paper-based books.
More details in the article. Thanks to Resource Shelf for the heads up.
My wife is a successful children’s book author primarily writing books about science and nature. So, this issue is very close to our hearts. One of the numerous variables that are often overlooked in calculating the environmental impacts of any product replacement is ecosystem services.
I just posted a new article this morning on this topic that is pertinent to the discussion of e-books versus paper-based books.
See my article: The Answer is Ebooks.
This issue is never simple. I drive a hybrid, and I know it’s not as environmental to produce as a non-hybrid, but over the life of the car, depending on how much I drive it, it will use half the gas of the same gas powered model.
I think from a green perspective, we need to measure differently. We need to look at the long term benefits.
The challenge right now with e-readers is that people buy the newest version when it comes out, if they can afford it, the long term savings are not being achieved because people aren’t using the first one for it’s full life.
I love my e-reader and it’s not just because it may nor may not be greener. The benefit for me of carrying all the books I’m reading or want to read is enough to stop me buying paper books.
Thanks for the post
I also think that the amount of paper saved by sending notes, maps, directions, articles, etc. directly to an ebook device instead of printing them out has to be taken into consideration. I know that I don’t print things out now unless I have to have numerous copies for a large group of people. If it is something for personal use or for my family, I just put it on an ereader.
My problem is that 22 books per year. I have trouble believing the average Kindle purchaser only reads 22 books per year. Most of us read 2 or 3 a week, so 100 would be a much better low end estimate. Maybe the fact that some ereaders never get used at all would even bring that down to 50, but 22 just seems too low.
The article clearly makes the mistake of comparing one book to one Kindle, which is a ridiculous comparison. And who said ebooks could only be read on a Kindle? I read mine on a cellphone, so no dedicated device had to be manufactured for me. That’s 0.3kg of materials, 100 kilowatts and 7.5 liters of water for a book compared to zero for my ebooks.
The article also doesn’t address the fact that with our present runaway climate problems we need intact, adult, carbon-absorbing trees on this planet much more than we need paper. Despite the statements from the logging and paper industries, forests are not being replenished as fast as they are being razed for paper, as they are replacing huge adult trees with saplings that won’t equal the carbon lost from cutting down an adult tree for decades or centuries. And of course, no mention is made of the amount of power and oil used to transport cut trees and paper products from forest, to mill, to warehouse, to store, mostly by truck.
In short, the NYT “life-cycle assessment” is clearly flawed and biased, if these are indeed the conclusions it reaches.
How many books, newspapers, and magazines do people discard or recycle per year? I bet that the number is in the millions. How many Kindles do people discard or recycle per year? I bet that number is close to zero. So the disposal side of the environmental argument still clearly favours e-books.