April 16, 2009 by Matt Thomas
Email spam is one of the most annoying phenomena of the modern world. They waste everyone’s time, clog up email accounts needlessly and part the vulnerable and stupid from their money with alarming efficiency. Today, another reason to hate spam and spamming has emerged, as if we needed one, the fact that it’s killing the environment.
According to a report from antivirus software provider McAfee, in cooperation with consultancy ICF International, the huge amounts of useless sales and scam emails sent every year are having a pronounced impact on the environment. According to McAfee, the sending of one spam email translates to 0.3 grams of carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere as a result of the wasted energy. This isn’t that much, though the huge volumes of emails we’re talking about mean that the effect starts to become significant very quickly.
The report estimates that the approximately 62 trillion spam emails sent every year use up 33 billion kilowatt hours of power.
Obviously those figures are huge and very troubling. However, McAfee have not released the figures for the harm to the environment caused by the legitimate email and computer use, probably because their agenda is to pour shame on spam mailers. Unfortunately, without those it’s difficult to put the figures in context.
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