Printing giant Ricoh has today launched a new green best practice guide for firms keen to limit their environmental impact.

Coming a day after the government published its draft climate change bill, which calls for legally-binding carbon emission reduction targets, the free, downloadable guide provides firms with a "Green To-Do List" that covers their entire business operations.

Chas Moloney, associate director of marketing at Ricoh UK, said that the guide has been tailored to provide firms with three recommendations for each area of their business, ranging from simple low-cost changes to major green investment programmes.

For example, the recommended simple change for transport is to encourage staff to use public transport by offering flexible starting and finishing times that allow them to avoid overcrowded commuter trains. Whereas the recommended major investment is to develop a full corporate transport policy built around online meetings and video conferencing technologies.

Similar best practice guidelines are available for areas such as waste management, water conservation, energy efficiency and procurement.

"A lot of environmental initiatives do require initial investments that are paid back over time," said Moloney. "This guide aims to point out that these are really beneficial, but there are a lot of things that can be done with minimal investment. If people just read it and ask if their company is at least taking the simple steps, then it will have a positive impact."

The new guide is the latest in a series of environmental initiatives from Ricoh. The firm recently launched a carbon offset scheme for customers that sees it donate money to a tree planting scheme in Africa to offset the emissions customers generate using Ricoh's equipment.