PlayStation 5 will consume less power in effort to combat climate change

The video game industry is banding together to combat climate change, with Sony Interactive Entertainment committing to lowering the power consumption of its next-generation PlayStation — at least while it’s in suspend mode — in an effort save more electricity.

In a statement from Sony Interactive Entertainment CEO Jim Ryan on the PlayStation Blog, the company announced that the “next generation PlayStation console will include the possibility to suspend gameplay with much lower power consumption than PS4 (which we estimate can be achieved at around 0.5 W). If just one million users enable this feature, it would save equivalent to the average electricity use of 1,000 US homes.”

While it remains to be seen how much electricity the successor to the PlayStation 4 — which will probably be called the PlayStation 5, if we’re wildly speculating — will consume during normal play, a next-gen console that draws less power much of the time sounds like good news.

But Sony’s not the only game company that has signed on to the Playing for the Planet Alliance, a partnership through which corporations have made commitments to reduce carbon emissions, reduce waste, and otherwise reduce their impact on the planet. Microsoft has also committed to making “825,000 Xbox consoles carbon neutral,” while cutting emissions as part of its manufacturing and delivery processes.

Other companies participating in the Playing for the Planet Alliance include Ubisoft, Supercell, Google Stadia, Green Man Gaming, Twitch, and Niantic. More details on those efforts are at the alliance’s official website.