Baylor University
OP-12: Electronics Purchasing

As part of Baylor University's larger sustainability efforts, Information Technology Services strives to conserve energy, recycle responsibly and reduce paper consumption. The following initiatives represent our ongoing efforts, and we continually analyze our processes to find areas where we can become more sustainable as we provide and support technology resources for faculty, staff and students. Equipment Seminar Room Computers: We recently realized reduced our energy use by 61% in one of our seminar rooms by upgrading the workstation configuration used by ITS and the University for technology training. The original workstation configuration required 3 power supplies and 2 network lines. The new configuration only requires a single network connection and reduced the number of power supplies to one. Click here to view a detailed summary of these energy savings (PDF). Servers: Moving existing servers to virtualized servers where possible is reducing the number of physical servers supported by ITS. The advantages include not only power reduction, but also less hardware to be recycled, and more physical space recovered in the existing server room. Loaner Program: By providing computers for the employee checkout program, departments can take advantage of a centralized resource so that departments will not have to purchase extra equipment for travel purposes. Hardware Installation & Repair Shop The Hardware Installations and Repair Shop work side-by-side to separate, sort, and recycle all electronic equipment. Packaging materials are disposed of in the following manner: Unused Packaged CDs are sent to Goodwill Computer Works VGA/DVI cables are sent to M. Lipsitz & Co., Ltd. Cardboard Boxes are reused for shipping Various Cardboard Materials are placed in campus recycling containers Plastic Bags & Paper are placed in campus recycling containers Composite Plastic Packaging & Styrofoam are reused as packing material The equipment returned by the Client Services Installations group is sorted according to age and working condition. If the systems are in good shape and in working condition, they go through a bidding process and are sold to local and national vendors. These proceeds go back into Baylor's general revenue fund. Equipment that is not in working condition or has not been used for spare parts is recycled as follows: Goodwill Computer Works M. Lipsitz & Co., Ltd. Monitors (LCD, CRT) Computers (Desktop, Laptops) Printers (Laser, Inkjet) Scanners Keyboards Mice Speakers Ink & Toner Cartridges Telephones Printer parts (drums, rollers, trays, duplexers) Mother boards Televisions VCR and projectors Server boxes and racks Hard Drives (degaussed and crushed) Power cables and wires Power supplies DVI/VGA cables DVI/VGA splitters Power adapters Aluminum frames and cans ITS is currently recycling all printers through the HP Trade-In Program. During the packing procedure, the installations department reuses the same boxes and packing material (Styrofoam) in which the new printer is shipped. Technology Procurement The following list represents the vendors used by the University for purchasing computers and printers. All of these vendors have established green initiatives that we take advantage of by purchasing their products: Apple Dell Hewlett-Packard Electronic Library Printing: By centralizing print management, excessive printing and print waste is reduced. Duplex printing by default is set for all public printers on campus. All printers located in the libraries use remanufactured toner and recycled paper. Displays: Window OS systems used in general access and departmental facilities are set to sleep mode when not in use for an hour or less. iMac displays are set to sleep mode after three minutes of inactivity. Computer Systems: CPUs in non-24-hour facilities are powered off over the weekend, Friday night through Saturday morning. All computers in the Moody Study Commons are turned off when facility is closed. Only EPEAT Gold Certified iMacs and Energy Star certified PCs are purchased for lab use.

Only EPEAT Gold Certified iMacs and Energy Star certified PCs are purchased for lab use.