Green Hands USA: America Volunteers

Are you a Mac person? If so, you've probably been salivating over the release of the new Snow Leopard operating system. Well here's one more reason to upgrade your OS: apparently, Snow Leopard reduces the energy use of Mac computers, which can result in small savings for individuals and huge savings for the Mac community as a whole.

According to a report on Computerworld, the Snow Leopard operating system uses less energy than the previous Mac OS, although the exact areas where that energy savings comes from aren't completely clear. Still, users have reported that laptop batteries on Macs running Snow Leopard last 10-20 minutes longer between charges.

CNET took it further, and testing showed that the owner of a 17-inch MacBook Pro running Snow Leopard would save 10KWh of energy per year. That's not a huge amount -- about $1 a year -- but extrapolated over the entire community of Mac users, that translates to about 50 gigawatts of electricity and $5 million in annual savings.

Not too shabby when you look at it that way.

But let's change the subject slightly. Apple has named its new OS after a critically endangered species, the snow leopard. Andrew Revkin of the New York Times recently asked, does this mean that Apple has a moral commitment to help preserve that endangered species in the wild? Apple hasn't made any type of statement about any such commitment, although some of its independent resellers are offering ways to help save snow leopards.

I'm hoping the Mac community will step up, too. The Snow Leopard Trust is currently seeking $25,000 in donations to help support its efforts. That's just a fraction of the money Mac users will save in energy costs from using the Snow Leopard OS. 

So if you use a Mac, consider two things: upgrading to Snow Leopard, and making a donation to help protect snow leopards in the wild. The environment will thank you.