Facilities looking to go green can turn to hand dryers to help meet sustainable goals. To make one ton of paper consumes 17 trees, pollutes 20,000 gallons of water and consumes three cubic yards of landfill space. So, a fast food restaurant with two restrooms could potentially use 2,000 pounds of paper towels — or the equivalent of 34 trees — each year. A typical school might use five tons of paper towels annually — about 89 trees.

While hand dryers do consume energy, newer high-speed models can use 80 percent less energy than traditional models. These hand dryers are so environmentally conscious that they qualify for LEED credits.