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So, you’re ethical – you bike to work a few days a week, compost your leftovers, contribute regularly to your local foodbank. Your business has a great recycling program, you turn your monitors off at night and use all-natural cleaning products. All-in-all, you feel pretty good about your footprint — as well you should! But there’s one more thing you may not have thought about; your web hosting!

A great many folks aren’t actually aware that such a thing as green web hosting is possible. And for those that are, the benefits of green hosting might be a bit of a mystery. This article aims to answer the question of why green web hosting is relevant to you, your website and the planet.

1. – ‘Cuz It’s Good for Business

So we’ll appeal to your conscience below, but first we’ll appeal to your business mind. ;) The tide is turning, delightfully, towards eco-consciousness. Green is the new…well, whatever the last buzz word was. I try not to pay attention.

What this means for those of us genuinely interested in the planet’s health is this: Actual potential for change and increased potential for actually making a living at something that is both ethical and profitable.

Greening your business or organization, no matter how big or small, has the immediate impact of both benefiting the planet and increasing the faith and trust of your audience.

2. – ‘Cuz Data Centers are (Potentially) Scary

This is the nitty-gritty:

According to a recent study by McKinsey & Company, data centers are slated to overtake the aviation industry by the year 2020 as a top greenhouse gas pollutant. 1 single medium-sized webserver can emit as much CO2 over the course of a year as an SUV that gets 15mpg. Consider that there are hundreds to thousands to tens of thousands of such servers in hundreds of thousands of Data Centers all over the planet and you’ll start to understand the level of impact.

So how can you mitigate some of the damage? By choosing a web host that houses their servers in a data center that powers itself with renewable energy, thereby eliminating that carbon output.

3. – ‘Cuz Carbon Offset Certificates are Cheating

This is a tough question to answer. A lot of web hosts out there call themselves “green” by simply purchasing carbon offset certificates in amounts equal to their consumption. Depending on where they buy their certificates, and the reputability of the company, this is certainly better than nothing. But it’s rather the environmental equivalent of eating your roommate’s last bagel and leaving them a dollar. Sure, they can go buy a bagel with that dollar, but you got yours the easy way, and they had to work for theirs. And in this case, what happens when your roommate goes to buy another bagel, but the store has run out? Ok, the metaphor is a stretch — but the point is:

Our planet’s resources are finite. Using them and then throwing money at that use is not as good as not using them at all. You can’t undo what’s been done. You can’t un-eat an entire chocolate cake, you can’t un-waste lost time, and you can’t un-use precious non-renewable resources. The best way to green your online presence is to choose a web host that uses renewable energy to power its servers. No guilty aftertaste!

4. – Choosing a good Green Web Host

I won’t pretend we aren’t biased. We think that Taproot Green Web Hosting is the best green host out there, and we hope you’ll choose us. But, just to be objective, here are some great rules of thumb to consider when choosing a green web hosting company:

• Are they directly powered by renewable energy, or using carbon offset certificates?
• Are they reselling hosting services from a larger host, or do they have their own dedicated servers?
• Do they offer any other green considerations? (telecommuting to save fuel? supporting local business?)
• Do they have quality in-house customer service, or have they outsourced to save costs?
• Are they allocating their resources reasonably to avoid overselling, or are they using unrealistic phrases like “Unlimited” ?

We hope you’ll consider moving forward with choosing a green host for your new site, or your existing site. We’d love to have you, but hope that no matter where you host, you host green!