The green shoots of hi-tech success

Environmental technologies have become big business.

Having blazed its way to the top of the political agenda, the environment is now a hot topic in company boardrooms around the globe.

Firms, keen to extol the green virtues of their products over rivals' goods, are investing serious money in an effort to clean up their acts.

Research by the Energy Saving Trust showed that the average home had up to 12 devices charging or on standby at any one time.

It was the sheer number of devices left on when not being used that triggered the idea behind Bye Bye Standby, a system that allows people to switch off all their equipment by pressing just one button.

Darryl Mattocks, managing director of Domia, described his eureka moment for his device.

"I was leaving my house early one morning, and you could just see there little red lights everywhere," he recalled, "and when I arrived in the office, again there were little red dots all over the place."

The system has two main components: "smart sockets" and a remote control.

"You plug a smart socket into the wall socket and then you plug your device into the smart socket," Mr Mattocks explained.

"When you go to bed, you press a button on the remote control and everything switches off. Likewise, in the morning you press the button and everything switches back on."

But why don't people just switch off or unplug things when they have finished using them?

"At the end of the day, there is an off switch on the socket and there is no reason why you cannot press that but, in reality, the socket is often in an inconvenient place - such as behind furniture."

Because the system uses radio frequencies to allow the remote control to communicate with the smart sockets, it needs to draw a small current itself in order to work.

But Mr Mattocks said: "We have got consultants to actually go through a typical lifestyle and usage and the small amount of power the unit consumes is far outweighed by the savings you make."

He says the system would help a typical household cut its electricity bill by £38 each year and save the equivalent of 166kg of carbon dioxide emissions.

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