How sustainable video games gear makes buying new hardware safer for the planet

metro.co.uk:

GameCentral looks at the environmental policies of hardware companies like Turtle Beach, Razer, and Logitech to see how green they really are.

Gaming is a huge business all around the world but so is its energy consumption. Game consoles alone consume billions of kilowatt-hours of energy per year and are made in plants that are themselves often run on fossil fuels. Games offer the ultimate escapism but recently it’s become harder for games companies to ignore the negative impact they have on the environment.

Businesses understand they can use their massive reach to promote sustainable initiatives and for the past couple of years some of the biggest publishers, including Microsoft and Bandai Namco, have come together for the Playing for the Planet initiative.

This aims to tackle climate change by promoting events such as the yearly Green Game Jam competition. There’s also the Green Games Guide, which is the UK’s first resource that contains practical advice for how the video games industry can help to reduce emissions and waste.

It’s difficult for games hardware and peripherals manufacturers to prove their green credentials. Even though supply chain issues and the cost of living crisis might have stalled our spending, there’s still peer pressure to buy the latest console or liquid cooled PC rig every couple of years.

Sustainability is becoming a core theme for many gaming peripheral companies, though, and with this awareness there’s a search for new methods to produce goods and deliver services in an eco-friendly way. Gaming relies on energy, but the industry has accepted that it needs to select its sources more discerningly, while avoiding being accused of ‘greenwashing’ with merely token efforts.

The industry is working to