Sustainability

USPS Blue Earth

USPS BlueEarth is a branded suite of customer services and product initiatives that provide sustainability solutions and innovations to our customers, including government agencies and businesses.

• USPS BlueEarth Carbon Accounting

  This no-fee service enables USPS business customers to measure and manage their greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. A video and information sheet provide an overview of this service.

  USPS follows the most widely accepted accounting methods to calculate your shipping and mailing GHG emissions based on item characteristics, including product type, size, weight, processing, distribution, and transportation. Customers using this service are provided Scope 3 Carbon Emissions statements specific to their actual USPS mailing and shipping.
  

  USPS annually inventories its GHG emissions and assigns GHG emissions by mailing types. Explore your reports online at the USPS.com® Business Customer Gateway (BCG). With our seamless user interface, you can customize your reports by mailing type emissions. 
  

  For more information or for reporting assistance, contact your USPS account representative or USPS Environmental Affairs and Corporate Sustainability at sustainability@usps.gov.

• USPS BlueEarth Federal Recycling Program

  We help make it easy for federal agencies and their employees to properly dispose of items like unwanted small electronics and phones. It’s easy to manage, free to federal agencies, supplements existing sustainability programs, and measurable results are available through online reports at FedRecycling.com.

• USPS BlueEarth Secure Destruction

  This service is a cost-effective, secure and convenient way to manage mail containing personal identifiable information. It’s designed specifically for business mailers who use the Intelligent Mail barcode. This technology enables the Postal Service to identify, intercept and securely shred undeliverable-as-addressed First-Class letters and flats with personal protected information that would otherwise be returned to the sender.

  See how it works

  For more information on Secure Destruction, visit PostalPro.

Additional USPS BlueEarth recommendations for direct mailers:

• Regularly update and improve your mailing lists to limit duplication and waste.
• Use research to effectively target your customers. Folks who live in apartment buildings, for example, probably don’t need lawn services.
• Allow customers to opt out of your mailings to ensure you’re not sending them unwanted mail.
• Reduce your return-to-sender mail volumes and avoid the carbon impacts of mail by using the USPS BlueEarth Secure Destruction program. Here’s more information.
• Use recycled materials for the mailings you create.
• When sourcing paper, make sure it comes from forests managed with practices certified by independent, third-party organizations such as the Sustainable Forestry Initiative and the Forest Stewardship Council.
• Design your mailings with a reduced impact to the environment by printing with water-based inks, on uncoated paper stocks, and sending windowless envelopes.
• Print on both sides of the paper to save resources and reduce mailing costs.
• Encourage your customers to recycle the mailing once they’ve read it, and tell them how you made your mailing as green as possible.