3 Ways Digital World is Contributing to Prevention of Global Warming

Specifically, we will be discussing the paper industry.

So it won’t be wrong to say that global warming is a serious issue. Wherever we are living in the world we must have felt some difference in the weather. There are various reasons which are responsible for that, but the cutting of a tree is something which I am concerned about while writing this article.

We all must have felt a weather change while we are travelling from a place where there is a concrete jungle to an area that is covered with trees. The trees obviously provide us with fresh air, oxygen, food etc. So there is no denying the fact that it should be saved at any cost.

As per my understanding, I feel becoming digital has helped a lot in respect of saving trees and avoiding global warming. We will be discussing various use cases where being digital has helped us directly by saving trees.

Mainly this article is focused on the paper manufacturing industry and the contribution of the paper industry to global warming. So just like me if you aren’t aware of the paper manufacturing mechanism, don't worry I got you covered.

Firstly we will discuss the research about the manufacturing process of the paper. Post that, we will discuss the role that the digital world has played in reducing their usage.

Paper Manufacturing Process.

Disclaimer: I am never been a part of the paper manufacturing industry, so all the information is based on my research. Moreover, we will discuss a broad manufacturing process, not the in-depth one.

Basically, the paper manufacturing process starts with cutting the tree, which is a clear red flag for anything. After cutting the tree they are passed for clearing of their bark, as bark has no contribution to the paper manufacturing process.

Although the bark can be used for other purposes like electricity production. After the bark removal process, the wood is sent for chopping into smaller pieces. The small pieces are then sent for boiling with water and other chemicals, which remove tree fibres that make the mixture soft.

After the removal of fibre is completed, the actual pulp is ready, using a chemical that is finally washed to give the tree a paper-like texture.
Finally, the blending machine converts it into a big sheet that is rolled into big rollers and packed. Once the paper sheet is packed it can be parcelled to different places. Based upon the need the notebook, books, diary, and packing paper are further manufactured from the sheet.

That is an overview of the paper manufacturing process. The main thing to consider is the cutting of trees. Everyone is aware about trees are the gift of mother nature, cutting even a single tree is causing harm in some way or other.

Mainly we need to discuss the role of technology in the prevention of global warming. The adaption of technology has played a vital role in helping the reduction of paper usage. Let's discuss that.

The schools and The colleges.

So most of us while attending our school, colleges or any institute must have given exams. These exams are normally offline in nature. You're required to answer some of the questions on a piece of the answer sheet.

During this corona period, almost all the exams went online. This online exam resulted in the enormous protection of trees. Like earlier, we don't have to fill the sheets with answers, contrary to that we just need to answer the question on an online portal.

Now multiply the number of students giving exams versus the number of paper sheets used. We can clearly see that it has saved a lot of paper. This paper can be used in other places where it is kind of necessary. Just like online examinations most colleges and schools are encouraging online submission of projects.

The hard copy of the project, thesis requires a lot of pages to be printed. Now, this directly impacts the trees as more requirements for paper lead to more cutting of trees.

Government / Private Offices.

Nowadays the government and private organisations are moving towards digital technology for communication and data-keeping. Many of them are storing the document in the form of Google docs, Microsoft word or any similar software.

This has helped them to maintain huge data. This also helped them when there is a need to search for any record. Obviously, the manual effort that was required earlier is replaced by the algorithm provided by the system. As we all know that there are millions of records that an organisation need to maintain. Of course, there would be a huge requirement of paper if done the traditional way.

Moving towards the digital world has helped the world in avoiding the disasters of Global Warming. This is a positive point of technology that most of us ignore.

The Electronic Mail.

Talking about the older era there was a tradition of sending letters, and postcards when we need to send some information. Introduction of the telephone as someone to reduce the necessity of letters.

But still wherever there is a requirement of record keeping, even now the preferred way is a hard copy of letters. This was the reason the telephone was not able to replace the letters.

The mail came to our rescue. Various industries which were using letters have moved to mail in which they can send data, files, text etc to another person within a second with just a click of a button.

Although in some places letters are still considered an official way of communication. But various other places for casual and official use of a hard copy of the letter have been successfully replaced by electronic mail.

Now if we think about billions of users sending hard copies of letters for communication the number of trees and other resources like fuel, and electricity would be impacted. This contribution is something that we take for granted but obviously, it was having a lot of potential in avoiding global warming.

Final Thoughts.

We know there are various factors that are contributing to the world crisis of global warming. Everyone is trying to contribute in a good way to avoid global warming.

The above mention points are a few of the benefits that technology has provided us. As educated users of technology, we should try to replace paper usage with technology counterpart.

Although paper is recyclable but is always better to reduce its usage. There are various other ways as well in which technology is impacting us for good. But this article was food for your thoughts so that you can promote the usage of technology in other places as well. Also if you have some ideas which others can implement do share them in the comments, together we all can make the world a better place.

About The Author

Apoorv Tomar is a Software developer and part of Mindroast. You can connect with him on Twitter, Linkedin, Telegram and Instagram. Subscribe to the newsletter for the latest curated content. Don’t hesitate to say ‘Hi’ on any platform, just stating a reference of where did you find my profile