The intermittent cleaning cycles tend to use just a mL of ink or so and keep clogs at bay. If you have a copy of the service manual for the printer, it should say how much ink is discharged per cycle type. The basic one on a UJF-6042 MKII is essentially zero for example. Don't have that model of printer or the manual for it, but Lots of shared programming across models. If you really want to stop the cycles, can power the printer down, but definitely not recommended. If you have a fresh waste tank, toss it in when you're not going to be printing for a few days or a week to see actual passive ink consumption. The cycles tend to be more noise than ink in my experience, but they are worthwhile.