News

Reading a printed newspaper is greener than reading the news online, but e-paper is the greenest option of all, according to new research.

Swedish researchers have claimed the environmental impact of one year of consumption of a printed newspaper is less than the impact of reading news online for more than 30 minutes a day.

However, using e-readers such as Amazon’s Kindle, which launched this week, results in a carbon footprint half the size of reading a printed newspaper.The study, carried out by the Swedish Royal Institute for Technology, found that a single person reading a daily printed newspaper in Europe uses the equivalent of 28kg of CO2 per year.

For a person reading web-based news for 30 minutes a day, the global warming potential is the equivalent of 35kg of CO2 per year.

For e-readers, which use e-paper that manufacturers claim is as comfortable to read as actual paper, the figure was 14kg. The low energy usage is due to the fact e-paper reflects light, rather than relying on a backlight, and is capable of permanently displaying the text without using electricity.The study, funded by paper company STFI-Packforsk and the


Swedish Newspaper Publishers’ Association, concluded that “e-paper has a potential for decreasing environmental impact of newspaper consumption”, but added that further work needed to be done to assess the impact of disposing of the e-readers.

The news came as Amazon launched its Kindle e-reader, onto which more than 90,000 newspapers and books can be downloaded.