Hi, I'm a green site.
You're right, I'm not the color green, but I'm 'green' from an environmental perspective.
Websites can be green?
YES!
Most people think that being sustainable is limited to houses and cars, but did you know that if the internet were a country, it would be the sixth most polluting country in the world?[src]. Web developers have an opportunity to make a difference here!
What makes a site green?
Great question! This site, and others like me, are green because they are:
- Served by green hosts - hosting companies can choose to have their datacenters powered by fossil fuel electicity or sustainable power. Here's a list of sustainable hosting companies. This page is powered by Cloudflare, here's their carbon commitment.
- Minimized Server Processing - The less resources (CPU, database queries, memory, etc) that is spent on the server the better. This page is static HTML, meaning the server simply has to send a file from disk, instead of compiling and executing server-side code (like PHP, python, or C#).
- Minimized Payload - The less data that's transferred across the internet infrastructure the better. Every byte of data from your images, scripts, etc has to be sent across many miles of wire, and handled via routers, switches, and other devices that take engergy. This entire page request uses under 20 KB of data transfer, and is served across a CDN so that distance between the user and the server is minimized.
- Minimized Client Processing - The less processing that's done in the browser the better. This page has no javascript, and lightweight CSS. I know it sounds silly, but every thing that needs to be computed via a browser (particularly a mobile device) is more power that it's taking from the grid (consider charging your phone).
Can I make my site green?
Please do! Every web developer has an opportunity to consume less, optimize resources, and be sustainably powered. Do your part to help the climate.