The next time you set out to clear the spam from your junk mail folder try to imagine each message not as an ephemeral digital annoyance, but as a tangible piece of trash. That would be a lot of waste, right? Well according to a new study by the research firm I.C.F. International, the carbon footprint of spam is not imaginary at all.
Last year an estimated 62 trillion junk emails were sent worldwide. That’s not really a difficult figure to believe. In fact, sometimes you might feel that they were all sent to you. But did you know that the energy it took to send those emails is equivalent to what it would take to drive a car around the world 1.6 times?
“The Carbon Footprint of E-mail Spam Report” shows the results of a study on the environmental impact of all that spam.
Here are a few of the findings:
“¢ An estimated 62 trillion spam e-mail messages were sent worldwide in 2008.
“¢ The annual energy used to transmit, process and filter spam worldwide totals 33 billion kilowatt-hours, equivalent to the electricity used in 2.4 million homes.
“¢ A single spam message produces the equivalent greenhouse gas emissions associated with driving three feet.
To be objective and fair to spammers, “The Carbon Footprint of E-mail Spam Report“ was commissioned by McAfee, which makes a lot of money selling anti-spam software and probably stands to make a lot more now that this report is out. But since spammers fall into the realm of those who deserve no justice (like bike thieves) just pretend you didn’t hear that last part. Anything to stop them the better.
[Via: New York Times]
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