How to make your website greener

“The internet may be digital, but it carries a very physical cost,” says Tom Greenwood, author of Sustainable Web Design. “From image files to colors to coding languages to servers, the choices we make in our web work can eat up electricity and spit out carbon – and as the internet grows, so does the cost to the environment.”

 

According to one study, the internet is responsible for roughly one billion tonnes of greenhouse gases a year, or around two per cent of world emissions.

 

So if you want to take action to improve sustainability at your charity, you can’t ignore your website. Luckily, there are ten simple steps you can take to make your website greener.

 

 

Keep content off your website

 

“The growth in webpage size over the years has been astounding,” says Gerry McGovern, author of World Wide Waste.

 

It’s easy to create content, and even easier to let it go out of date. The more you have, the harder it is to keep track of, update and improve it.

 

“Keep a small amount of good stuff instead,” says agitation designer James Mullarkey. “Bin off the old and be totally ruthless.”

 

 

Use system fonts

 

“Stop using custom web fonts,” says Jack Garfinkel, Senior Content Designer at Scope. “They can be huge.” If you really have to use custom web fonts, use them carefully.

 

 

Reduce file size

 

“Cut down on the big file size stuff,” says Garfinkel. The top offenders are video and larger images. Try lighter alternatives. “SVGs are tiny and scale well.”

 

“Images have the potential to add an awful lot of weight to webpages,” says McGovern. “By using a more energy-efficient format like .webp,  [my new website was] able to reduce average image weight by almost 35%.”

 

 

Drop third party scripts

 

Third party scripts from video embeds, chat widgets, or social sharing buttons (to name a few top culprits) slow your site down, eating up energy and adding to the strain on servers. Ditch them. Your users should enjoy speedier loading times, too.

 

Do you really need tracking via Google Analytics? Perhaps, if you’re making frequent, meaningful changes to your website based on that data, so you can serve your users much more effectively. Otherwise, you may just be tracking vanity metrics.

 

 

Get carbon clarity 

 

In 2019, James Mullarkey checked the environmental impact of Friends of the Earth’s website. By showing them how environmentally unfriendly it was, Mullarkey may have shocked Friends of the Earth into sorting their site out.

 

His approach was simple. He checked the site’s carbon impact, then checked back later, then checked back again.

 

Whether you’re deep into improvements or just starting out, you can get a tangible sense of progress and achievement by keeping an eye on your carbon footprint.  

 

Start by understanding your website’s current carbon footprint. And don’t forget about your organisation’s cloud storage.

 

 

Choose a green web host

 

Does your web host use renewable energy to power their servers, invest in responsible carbon offsetting, and dispose of old hardware safely? Use the Green Web Foundation’s Green Web Check tool to find out.

 

 

Cut down on wasted user journeys

 

If users can’t find exactly what they’re looking for, they may bounce around your website for too long trying to find it. It’s a poor user experience for them, and a pointless carbon cost for the planet.

 

Test and refine your navigation, keep content crisp and concise, and ensure your search engine results page (SERP) descriptions are clear, so people know what they’ll get when they click.

 

 

Know that green content is better content

 

Environmentally-friendly websites are almost always better websites. When you declutter your site, you’ll get a cleaner, lighter, quicker user experience. There will be less content to keep track of, so you can maintain it to a higher standard. Your users will find what they’re looking for, speedier and with more ease. Everybody wins.

 

 

Impact adds up

 

Climate change is overwhelming. It’s tempting to think that we can’t do anything to slow down the wave of change. But even small changes add up.

 

“There are about 1.8 billion websites out there” say Gerry McGovern. “Waste data, waste code, waste content, has real consequences, is a real driver of global warming. Everything we do, no matter how small, to reduce CO2 emissions – it matters.”