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Printing costs Carthage many thousands of dollars each year. There are many ways to decrease the amount of paper and toner consumed. The best way is one of the easiest: use Print Preview. Often you may only need one page, but the entire printout could be five pages long. Sometimes, that last little footer bleeds over onto a second or third page and wastes a sheet of paper. Next time, before you print, use the Print Preview feature in your web browser, word processor, etc.  It could help us save money, trees, electricity, and time. The environment will thank you, and so will we.

Here are some cost details:  

  • Each sheet of paper costs nearly 1 cent
  • Each “impression” - a printed sheet, one side of one page, not including the paper - printed on the big copier printers such as those in the library - costs 3 cents
  • Each impression printed on a smaller, personal laser printer averages around 5 cents per side
  • Each impression printed on an inkjet printer costs about 12 cents per side
  • Impression costs include the toner, the cost of the printer itself, and the maintenance of the printer or copier

Cutting out 10 single-sided pages per week during an academic year would save $12 per person. If 2,000 people do that, we can collectively save $24,000.  That’s money that could be better spent on other things, including computers, library resources, etc. Let’s work together to make this a greener and more sustainable campus.  You can help make that difference.