Sustainable IT | Ted Samson » Sun boasts benefits of Internet-delivered stock docs

October 18, 2007 | Comments: (0)

Sun boasts benefits of Internet-delivered stock docs

TAGS: Paper waste

I'm always interested in ways that companies can reduce their paper waste -- especially if it also can reduce the amount of mail I receive that generally ends up going straight into the recycle bin.

Thus, I was pleased to learn, albeit belatedly, that the SEC has deemed it acceptable for companies to make proxy materials available to shareholders via the Internet, rather than having to mail them thick packets of documents. Under the SEC ruling, shareholders still have the option of having the printed materials mailed to them.

A Sun rep sent me a note telling me about the company's success thus far with the SEC ruling: "On September 25, Sun announced that it will leverage this new approach and made its own materials available on sun.com for its 2007 Annual Meeting of Stockholders. We were very pleased by the environmental savings that resulted from cutting the number of printed proxy materials from 800,000 down to 75,000 copies."

By Sun's calculations, reducing the number of printed materials totals:
- 11,964 trees
- 9.5 million gallons of waste water
- 515 metric tons solid waste diverted from landfills
- 99,700,000 fewer pages (or 199,400 reams of paper)

The benefits here aren't strictly environmental, of course. This saves Sun a tidy bundle of cash in printing and mailing costs, though the company didn't specify how much.

Here's hoping other company's embrace the SEC ruling, if not for the Earth, or for their bottom line, than for the sake of mail carriers everywhere.

Posted by Ted Samson on October 18, 2007 11:57 AM

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