Written by Courtney McKay.
To celebrate the launch of the new Sync NI ‘Green Tech’ section of our news site, this tech trends blog will take a look at some of the best lifestyle green tech products.
Green tech is everywhere nowadays as the climate crisis becomes an increasingly evident problem in global affairs. Many companies want to be part of healing the earth and preventing more damage from happening, and this also means there is a large market that has the potential to be extremely profitable.
Technology developments in the sustainability sector are often perceived as being extensive and unapproachable for the average Joe, but the most effective and commonly used ones are things you probably use everyday!
Smart home devices
If you were looking for your first step to utilize tech to go green, smart home devices are an easy option. Not only do these minimize the amount of electricity you’ll use, but they also will save you money and help you keep tabs on how much you’re using.
LED Lighting
This tech experienced rapid development and adoption over the last decade, due to it being very environmentally friendly and offering a perfect swap for traditional bulbs. As well as using 85% less energy than traditional bulbs, they have an extremely long life span of approximately 30 years, based on them being used for 4 hours each day.
Additionally, mass adoption of this tech meant increased competitiveness in the market, which meant that the cost of LED lightening dropped significantly. As lighting is responsible for around 15% of your house’s electrical consumption, LED lighting is an investment that certainly pays off both in the short term and long term.
Electric Vehicles
In the last few years, electric cars have grown in popularity and for good reasons. Not only do they serve to limit carbon emissions, but they also are more convenient as their fuel is electricity, so you can charge it up at home or out and about at charging stations. Moreover, it has been found they are more efficient than petrol or diesel cars, as they can convert over 70% of the electric power directly to the wheels of the car which is more than twice that of fuel-powered cars.
Northern Ireland has various opportunities within the EV sector, with local companies such as GoPlugable and Weev working to reduce barriers to EV adoption.
Telecommuting software and working from home
The rise of remote working has seen many benefits including promoting flexible working and a healthier work-life balance. Additionally, there are many environmental advantages to working from home. Firstly, as people are not travelling on their work-from-home days, it minimises the number of cars on the road which ultimately will reduce carbon emissions. Digitization has also increased since remote working has been introduced, which reduces paper consumption. As offices are not in full use, electricity consumption will also be reduced, however, this does mean shifting power consumption costs to the employees but ultimately will reduce overall electricity consumption.
Northern Ireland has seen a major increase in working from home and flexible working since the pandemic in 2020, with a recent survey reporting that over a third of workers in the country are now hybrid working.
These are just some examples of accessible green tech but there are many bigger-scale, more advanced green tech options that are being developed and implemented by local companies that are making a global impact with their innovative climate tech.
On the next green tech edition of the tech trends blog, we’ll take a look at some of the local companies, here in Northern Ireland, that are making some revolutionary high-scale tech.
To see more content on GreenTech, click here.
