March 16, 2009 - Microsoft says it aims to reduce its carbon emissions per unit of revenue by at least 30% (from 2007 levels) by 2012.

The announcement was made Thursday in an all-employee email sent by Microsoft CEO Steven Ballmer. In a blog entry posted the same day, company sustainability chief Rob Bernard wrote:

"As a technology company, we believe that our footprint goals will be met by leveraging software and technology. We will work to provide advances in our building operations, we will continue to expand our use of our Unified Communications tools...and will look for new ways to reduce our use of resources in our datacenters by continuing to push the envelope on innovation in how datacenters are designed, built, and operated."

"There is much more that we are focused on in addressing environmental sustainability," Bernard continued. "Microsoft and the IT industry in general have a tremendous opportunity to help people and organizations around the planet reduce their energy use and carbon emissions both through dramatically more efficient IT products, and by unlocking the power of IT to enable a more efficient economy through smart grids, smart buildings, telepresence, and more."

Microsoft saved more than $90 million in travel costs via remote conferencing tools, Bernard noted.

Greener IT could reduce global greenhouse gas emissions by 15% and save global industry $800 billion in annual energy costs by 2020, according to a report out last June.