Hardware and end user devices
On a classic IT estate, device manufacturing weighs more than all their in-use electricity consumption. The decisive lever is therefore neither machine power nor energy efficiency, but how long they stay in service and the equipment ratio actually needed.
CHALLENGES
Engagement framework and macro challenges
The topic is structurally shared between procurement, IT asset management, end user services and finance, which explains why it stays weakly steered. The first task is to rebuild a usable inventory, then to document the rule that currently triggers a replacement.
Engagement scope
Dimensions and stakes addressed in the field
Inventory and actual estate perimeter
Workstations, screens, docking stations, phones, tablets, printers, video conferencing equipment and local network hardware. We reconcile asset management data, endpoint management tools, lease contracts and supplier invoices, then qualify the gaps. Dormant machines, never returned or held in stock, show up almost systematically at this stage.
Service life and replacement policy
Moving a laptop fleet from 3 to 5 years cuts the amortised annual footprint by around 40 %, while also lowering capital expenditure. The trade-off involves extra maintenance cost, end user support load, security requirements tied to patch availability and the performance expected by the business. We build that calculation by user population, never on an estate average.
Reuse, refurbished equipment and end of life
A second life for equipment avoids a full manufacturing cycle, which makes it the most powerful lever on the estate. We qualify refurbishment channels, associated warranties, traceability of data erasure and compliance with waste electrical and electronic equipment regulation. Buying refurbished hardware for certain populations is examined alongside resale of the outgoing estate.
Over-equipment and dormant devices
Duplicate equipment inherited from hybrid work, machines assigned to departed employees, test stations kept as a precaution, extra screens handed out without a rule. Those devices cost nothing in electricity, yet they carry their full manufacturing footprint. A return campaign produces an immediate gain, with no service degradation.
Responsible procurement and supplier requirements
Product environmental certifications, repairability index, spare parts availability, warranty duration and security patch commitments, manufacturing footprint documented per reference. Those criteria are translated into enforceable clauses in your tenders, with an explicit weight in the scoring grid, rather than into declarative commitments.
Virtual desktops and workload offloading
Virtual desktops extend terminal service life, but they shift consumption to the data centre and add infrastructure to amortise. The outcome depends on the pooling ratio achieved, the service life actually gained on terminals and the carbon intensity of the hosting region. We cost both sides before any recommendation.
METHODOLOGY
Our approach
- 01
Rebuild the inventory
Cross-referencing asset management sources, endpoint management tools, lease contracts and invoices, with gaps qualified. Each device is tied to its commissioning date, its user population and its actual status, active, dormant or held in stock.
- 02
Model the amortised footprint
Manufacturing emission factors applied per equipment category, amortised over observed service life rather than accounting life. The result explicitly separates manufacturing from use, the only way to objectify the real weight of the replacement policy.
- 03
Cost the scenarios in dual units
Extended service life, reduced equipment ratio, use of refurbished hardware and the virtual desktop trade-off are evaluated in euros and in kgCO₂e, including maintenance cost and support load. Scenarios are built by population, with security and performance constraints made explicit.
- 04
Anchor decisions in processes
Trade-offs translated into a documented replacement rule, weighted criteria in tenders, a return procedure and a contracted end of life channel. Without that anchoring, the replacement cycle returns to its previous pace from the following year.
WORKED EXAMPLE
Extend service life before optimising consumption
A laptop whose manufacturing represents around 250 kgCO₂e sees its amortised annual footprint vary sharply with the service life retained alone, at identical in-use consumption.
Moving from 3 to 5 years cuts the amortised footprint by 40 % and lowers capital expenditure in the same proportion. No configuration or power management optimisation reaches that order of magnitude on an end user estate.
Illustrative order of magnitude. The manufacturing value varies with model, memory capacity and the emission factor source retained. In-use consumption, in the range of 15 to 30 kgCO₂e per year on an average European grid, adds to these figures.
DELIVERABLES
Sample deliverables
- Consolidated inventory of the end user estate, by equipment category, user population, commissioning date and actual status
- Amortised footprint model separating manufacturing from use, with documented emission factors and assumptions
- Analysis of dormant devices and equipment ratio per population, with the immediate gain from a return campaign
- Replacement policy scenarios costed in euros and in kgCO₂e, including maintenance cost and support load
- Weighted environmental criteria grid to embed in hardware tenders, with the corresponding clauses
- Qualification of reuse and end of life channels, traceability of data erasure and regulatory compliance
- Arbitration note on virtual desktops, costed on both the terminal side and the data centre side
KPIS
Steering indicators
- Average estate age and effective service life per equipment category
- Annual amortised footprint per user, in kgCO₂e
- Equipment ratio per population, terminals and screens per user
- Share of refurbished hardware in the year's purchases
- Return rate of outgoing equipment and share directed to reuse
- Share of purchased references meeting the environmental criteria of the standard
FAQ
Frequently asked questions
Continue reading
- GHG Protocol framework
Where equipment is accounted for under the GHG Protocol.
- Optimisation and eco-design
The counterpart on infrastructure and applications.
- Environmental measurement
The measurement method applied to the end user estate.
- Compliance & CSRD
The financial and regulatory translation of the replacement plan.