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April 23, 2008 The State of the Art in Sustainable IT SLM Home | Green IT News & Ideas | Connections | Events | About

Energy Efficiency: The First Step in Green IT Three in four CIOs consider green IT an important element in their overall IT strategy, and 15% rate it as their top priority, according to a recent Datamonitor survey. Good intentions are well and good, but where should your IT shop begin its green journey? Given the myriad of possible entry points, it's an important question. Answers vary depending on your context: From the top-down: Align to your firm's companywide sustainability initiatives. For example, if waste reduction is a corporate goal, start by enforcing double-sided printing, or begin recycling or donating your end-of-life IT assets. From the bottom-up: Take stock of pains in your IT shop. Green IT can help minimize - or even eliminate - out-of-budget, out-of-power, or out-of-space challenges. For example, if datacenter space is limited, server virtualization is a common consolidation technique with green benefits, such as energy savings and reduced e-waste from operating less physical servers. My advice? Focus your initial green IT efforts on reducing IT's energy consumption. Why? Reducing IT's energy footprint offers tangible benefits, both environmental (reduced CO2) and economic (reduced costs). I'm not going out on a limb here - just look at the IT user and vendor communities: Users are asking...according to a recent survey by Forrester Research, the number-one green IT motivation for IT procurement and operations professionals is "reducing energy-related operating expenses." ...and vendors are reacting. The vendors have been picked up on this, one-upping each other with energy efficiency improvements - just last week both Sun and IBM touted energy-efficiency innovations in their server and supercomputer hardware. However - and there's always a "but" - before reconfiguring your IT environment or spending money on new energy-efficient equipment, quantify IT's portion of the energy bill. The old adage that "you can't manage what you can't measure" is particularly relevant here: you will not be able to accurately quantify, and then report to senior management, the environmental and economic benefits of any green IT initiative without establishing a baseline on which to track improvement. A final word of encouragement for the CIOs out there: Your success in making the business case for green IT - particularly as it relates to energy savings - has far-ranging consequences for your company's overall environmental strategy. Armed with solid numbers you'll be better equipped to get the rest of the C-suite thinking about how greener (read: smarter) IT can pay dividends throughout the organization. ~Doug Washburn, SLM Advisor What do you think? Post Your Comment Here! This Week's Top Stories... Report: CIOs Being Frozen Out of Firms' Climate Strategies Bold climate commitments aside, companies continue to overlook the role of IT in minimizing carbon footprint - and CIOs seem reluctant to act as changemakers, according to a new report from the Economist Intelligence Unit. The survey of senior executives finds that despite the availability of climate-friendly technologies such as teleworking, video conferencing, and supply-chain optimization, just 36% of companies specifically mention IT activities in their emissions-reduction plans. Read more... Why Windows XP May Be Driving Up Your Energy Bills It's simple: Unlike Vista, Windows XP doesn't give system administrators the ability to manage power settings over a network - and most IT managers are reluctant to pursue third-party power-management options, ComputerWorld reports. Read more... Free Tool Helps IT Managers Right-Size Servers for Energy Efficiency SizingLounge has released a free online tool for sizing servers that includes energy efficiency variables in its cost calculations. The new tool is designed to help IT managers identify the power usage effectiveness (PUE) of their datacenters, as defined by Green Grid standards. Read more... Green IT Earning a Place in Core Business Strategy, CIOs Say One in five firms have incorporated a green IT agenda into their core business strategy, while a further third are set to roll out similar strategies within the next two years, according to a new CIO survey from Datamonitor. More than 75% of CIOs surveyed consider green IT an important element in their overall IT strategy - and 15% rate it as their top priority. Read more... Future Sun Servers to Feature Adjustable Power Settings Sun's plans for future datacenter offerings include servers that can be run at different power settings depending on the user's energy requirements, InfoWorld reports. Speaking at a Sun Labs Open House event last week, Sun exec Subodh Bapat said such "power-managed" servers might be tuned to run at half their potential power draw. Read more... IBM's New Supercomputer Uses Water to Save Energy IBM has unveiled a new supercomputer that is cooled by water instead of air, cutting energy use by up to 40%. The new "Hydrocluster" supercomputer uses water-chilled copper plates located above each microprocessor to remove heat. Read more... More Green IT News & Tools... We want to hear from you! Post your comments or questions below any SLM news story and we'll feature the best of them here. (Note: You must be a registered SLM user to post. Not yet signed up? Click here!) Forward to a Friend! Sustainable Brands ‘08 on Track to Double in Size! SB'08 will put you in personal touch with the leaders of the sustainable brand movement, including senior executives from Dow, Clorox, HP, Yahoo!, Method, Interface, Keen Footwear, New Belgium Brewery, Steelcase, Nestle, Seventh Generation, IDEO, Frog Design, Ziba Design, and more. Download the conference agenda here (PDF), and register today -- signups are already topping last year’s final figures! Martin Melaver on Greening the Culture First Melaver Inc. has achieved a string of "firsts" in greening the real estate business, including the first LEED-certified all-retail shopping complex in the U.S., but CEO Martin Melaver says truly innovative, sustainable business projects begin at home. In this SLM interview, Martin explains how a single corner grocery became a pioneering - and extremely successful - real estate empire without losing its soul along the way. Read more... Top Headlines from Other SLM Channels National Grid to Create "Carbon Budgets" for Business Operations HP Greens Air Freight from China, Earns Smartway Logo Sony Turns Old TVs into New Flat-Screens High-Profile Green Programs Can Cut Both Ways, Survey Findse 72% of Businesses "Paying More Attention" to Energy Efficiency? DuPont, Nissan, ADM Top "Toxic 100" HR Execs Cautioned Against "Wal-Mart Effect" U.S. Manufacturers Spend $26 Billion on Pollution Reduction Office Depot Launches Green Office Products Line Tiny Fuel Cells Headed for a Greener Gadget Near You Find Peers and Partners If you haven’t already joined the fastest growing online sustainable business community, create a profile now and start connecting. Advertise on SLM! Become a Sustainable Life Media advertiser or sponsor and reach thousands of business leaders looking for product or service solutions to help them build their sustainability story. Click here to learn more. Have a story you want told? Send it to us!

Sustainable Life Media is home for business professionals looking to build new value and competitive advantage by innovating more sustainable processes, practices and products. We bring you top stories related to the what, who and how of environmental and social innovation, and help you connect with thought leaders, peers, partners and solutions providers that can help you quickly reach your goals. This work is licensed under a CreativeCommons License. Copyright Sustainable Life Media Inc. 2008

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