Working From Home Helps Battle Climate Change

Working from home instead of commuting to work
can help combat climate change, but
you have to do it right. 

 Your boss might not like you working from home. But you might, since you don't have to hassle with the annoying commute every day.  

If you want to press your case to work remotely instead in the office, try this really good argument, courtesy of the Washington Post: 

"Fully remote workers could produce less than half the climate-warming emissions of people who spend their days in offices according to a new study published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences."

Switching from working onsite to working from home full time could reduce a person's emissions by 50 percent. Hybrid schedules, where people work from home two to four days a week can cut emissions buy 11 to 29 percent. 

It does seem like a large proportion of employers are gravitating toward the hybrid model, but that won't  reduce fossil fuel consumption as much as working exclusively from home could. 

Many employers have really gravitated to a hybrid model, but that might have that much effect in battling climate change.

The climate benefits of working from home only work if you do it right. Which can get complicated. 

As Scientific American reports, the analysis regarding the environmental effects of working at home looked at five factors: Commuting, non-commute travel, information technology devices and residential energy use. 

If at least part of  your motivation for working at home is to fight climate change, you still have to be smart about it. Sure, eliminating your commute will prevent fossil fuel emissions. But the analysis indicates some people who work from home end up taking several short car trips during the work day, which cancels out the positive effects of avoiding a commute.  

Working from  home might also tempt you to crank up the air conditioning in your home on hot summer days, or blasting the heat in the winter. That also offsets the climate change fighting power of working at your home office instead of commuting in to the cubicle farm.

(OK, as I write this from home, I just now realized an unnecessary light was on.  This story inspired a tiny, tiny bit of good: I just shut off the light. Perfectly bright enough in here).

If your boss insists on making you come to the office, you can greatly offset your carbon footprint by taking public transportation or riding your bike.  In many places, including here in Vermont, public transportation is woefully inadequate in getting people to and from their jobs with a decent level of efficiency.