Making your website more environmentally friendly

At Liven Creative we’re researching how to improve our own website in minimising it’s impact on the world.

Below is a selection of useful tips we have discovered on our travels to becoming digitally more sustainable:

Tips for Low-Carbon Web Development

A website’s carbon footprint starts with its build. Here’s how to keep your site efficient:

Prioritise Speed: Slow websites consume more energy and produce more CO2. Reducing the number of large files (images, videos, etc.), limiting plugins, and using optimised hosting can all contribute to faster load times.

Minimise Tracking Scripts: Tracking data consumes significant energy. Limit scripts to only the essentials and ensure they are user-friendly and privacy-focused.

Write Clean Code: Clean, streamlined code enhances performance. Removing unnecessary elements and using modular frameworks reduces excess weight, leading to faster load times and lower emissions.

Optimise Web Apps: Web applications are data-intensive. Developers should focus on optimising every byte for performance, minimising data processing, and cutting down on energy consumption.

Use Less JavaScript: While JavaScript is powerful, it can add weight and increase device processing needs. Consider alternatives like CSS for front-end interactions.

Sustainable Design Practices

Creating an eco-friendly website starts at the design stage:

Reduce Images: Images significantly contribute to a website’s bulk. Before adding images, ask if they provide genuine value to the user. If not, consider excluding them to boost loading speed and lower carbon output.

Use Efficient Image Formats: For necessary images, compress and resize them. Use appropriate formats like .webp for photos, .png for transparent graphics, and .svg for icons.

Limit Video Use: Videos are data-heavy. Use them only when they truly add value, and ensure they’re short, compressed, and don’t auto-play.

Choose Fonts Wisely: Web fonts can be large files. Opt for system fonts to minimise carbon impact, reducing the number of external files that need to load.

Simplify User Journeys: Streamlining your website’s navigation ensures visitors find what they need quickly, reducing the number of pages they view and the overall energy consumption.

Thoughtful Content Strategy

A purposeful content strategy not only benefits your users but also minimises your website’s carbon footprint:

Focus on Quality: Prioritise content that directly answers your audience’s key questions. This reduces unnecessary page visits and load times.

Regularly Remove Old Content: Outdated content contributes to your site’s size without providing value. Implement regular content audits to keep your site lean.

Create Evergreen Content: Produce content that remains relevant over time. This reduces the need for constant updates and creates a more streamlined user experience.

Sustainable Hosting

Your website’s carbon footprint largely depends on its hosting:

Select Green Hosting: Choose hosts that run on renewable energy. This can dramatically reduce your site’s environmental impact.

Utilise Caching: Caching static versions of your web pages decreases the energy required to load dynamic content, speeding up load times.

Use Local Data Centres: Hosting your website in data centres close to your target audience reduces energy consumption and improves speed.

Our next step is to start optimising our own website with these principles in mind, we’ll update our progress on our next article.