If the Internet were a country, it would be in 6th place behind China, USA, the EU, India and Japan. It consumes almost as much electricity with its devices as Canada and Germany combined — and the trend is rising. Green electricity and saving energy are therefore increasingly becoming the focus. Read here how this can be achieved and verified through sustainable web design.
Web design — sustainable design
In recent years, numerous studies have focused on the electricity requirements of information and communication technologies (ICT). The science portal quarks.de researched this topic and listed the sources. With electricity consumption, CO goes2- emissions associated with it.
In addition to using renewable energy, sustainable web design can improve digital CO2-Lower your footprint. Tom Greenwood, Managing Director of the sustainable London-based WordPress agency Wholegrain Digital, sheds light on this aspect in his book “Sustainable Web Design.” He gives practical tips on leaner, faster, CO2-more efficient and user-friendly websites.
Gerrit Schuster also mentions on his site sustainable-webdesign.now appropriate methods.
In order to achieve the goal of sustainability, a few screws can be turned in web design. These are essentially:
• Clear structure
• Easy navigation
• Good text structure
• Relevant images in optimized size
• Careful use of videos
• Choice of colors
• Font types
• Server calls
• Energy-efficient programming languages
What does sustainable web design mean in detail?
The clear structure and intuitive navigation of websites ensure that users find what they are looking for more quickly. This also includes texts with the most important things at the beginning. This reduces the volume of data to be loaded. On the one hand, this saves energy and is rewarded by Google & Co., on the other hand. A picture is worth a thousand words, but an image only becomes relevant in the right context. It is therefore important to avoid unnecessary images and excessively high image resolutions; a simple graphic is often sufficient. If an image does, then the file size must be adjusted to the display size and use “lazy loading”. Avoid picture carousels that only distract and confuse.
Streaming services such as YouTube, Netflix and Co. Without videos, the CO would cause the largest data transfer2-Network footprint reduced by 80% When using videos on websites, they should provide so much added value that the increased CO2-Expulsion justifies.
Even the color choice influences electricity demand. The colors white and blue consume the most energy on OLED screens; warmer, darker colors are more economical.
When it comes to fonts, variable fonts score points. Font subscriptions such as Adobe Fonts or fonts.com with permanent server requests should be avoided. Overall, web designers should avoid unnecessary plug-ins and libraries. It's best to save on code and not use JavaScript thoughtlessly.
Websites — CO2-Check output
On Tom Greenwood's website websitecarbon.com Can the CO2-Check your footprint. Simply enter the URL and determine sustainability.
The review of Greenwood's website wholegraindigital.com reveals:” Hooray! This website is cleaner than 93% of the websites tested.” It produces 0.07 g CO each time you visit2. With 10,000 monthly page views per year, Greenwood can with the same CO2-Emissions travel 150 km with an electric car.
Green website hosting
To the CO2-Lowering your footprint is another important aspect of hosting. The provider's servers should run on 100% green power. Web designers should make their customers aware of this, because companies are often not aware of this.
