Video conferencing is a friend of the environment. It helps reduce the volume of CO2 emissions from cars and reduces traffic congestion on our roads (as well as improving company productivity and reducing costs!).

As governments throughout the world look to cut their CO2 emissions to meet global treaties, such as Kyoto, companies can use video conferencing as an easy means of achieving just that. Many leading companies now use video conferencing both as a key component of their business strategy and a vital cog in their environmental plans as well.

Lex Vehicle Leasing, part of the RAC group, has been using video conferencing between its Manchester, Marlow and Stirling offices and since the beginning of 2004 estimates that it has saved over 80 tonnes of CO2 from being emitted into the atmosphere. In addition to this environmental benefit the company also reported time savings of almost 6,000 hours from employees not travelling to meetings and getting bogged down in congestion.

To put this into perspective this figure equates to over 150 working weeks when Lex employees were at their desks helping customers and not stuck in their cars travelling too and fro.

There are also several important steps to take when setting things up at your end to ensure that the videoconference runs smoothly.

If you have offices overseas or deal with overseas clients the cost and environmental savings can be even larger. No longer do you have to travel abroad to meet with customers, colleagues or suppliers. Conduct your meetings over the web from the comfort of your office and save thousands of pounds and do your bit for the environment!

Adi Gaskell is the founder of http://www.WebVideo4U.co.uk, a leading developer of Flash based streaming video solutions.

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