Although IT directors may be getting sick of all the
noise aroundgreen IT, it is clear that the hype is
way ahead of the reality for most organisations.
But that is not to say that
environmental issues are not steadily rising up the agenda at
the highest levels of the business.
Euan Davis, a senior analyst at Forrester Research, says,
"Corporate social responsibility used to be for tree-huggers, but
now when people talk about it, it is in terms of energy usage and
cost savings, so it has morphed into concerns around environmental
management."
Green pressures
In Davis' view, there are three key categories into which most
organisations fall in relation to this. The first comprises those
that have been required to explore the issue as a result of
legislation. For example, since January 2005, heavy industry
sectors such as electricity generation and mineral processing have
been legally required to monitor and report on their greenhouse gas
emissions and to participate in the
European
Union Emissions Trading Scheme.
This narrow scope is scheduled to broaden by 2020 as a result of
the UK government's Carbon Reduction Commitment programme, which is
intended to make emissions trading mandatory for all large
commercial and public sector organisations.
The second group comprises those companies that are being forced
to go green because of pressure "from the ground-up", which
includes customers, suppliers, personnel and, increasingly,
prospective staff, particularly young graduates.
The third category relates to those firms, particularly in the
retail sector, that want to be seen as green to boost their brand
value - although there is often a big gap between the PR and the
reality.
Simon Mingay, research vice-president at analyst firm Gartner,
says there is also a fourth category.
"Some senior managers are starting to recognise both the
strategic risk and potential opportunities that climate change
poses to both the business and the wider economy. Therefore, they
are making green announcements way before the rest of the
organisation is in any shape to do anything about it and so are
acting as a catalyst for change," he says.
Split focus within businesses
Mingay says this approach can lead to a "disconnect" between the
top of the organisation and IT directors, who are generally more
concerned with keeping systems running and saving money.
He says the same discrepancy in attitude also exists between
different vertical markets, where there are huge differences in the
speed and depth of action being taken. So although financial
services, retail, telecoms and high-tech industries are moving
quickly, the public sector, for one, has to date been very slow to
go green.
Despite issuing requests for proposals mandating green
technology, Mingay says that in terms of materially changing
operations, they have "done virtually nothing" - although he
expects this to change during 2008 because of political pressure
and because of the tentative emergence of programmes focused
primarily on saving energy.
"If you look at what is happening in the market now, people are
predominantly focusing on saving money and if that means they can
make a song and dance about saving CO2 and energy, great.
"Having said that, some organisations do really get it and are
keen to cut CO2 even if they have to spend money doing it, but they
are in the minority," says Mingay.
Nonetheless, he expects this situation to change over the coming
years, not least as new climate change prevention legislation
starts to emerge.
"This problem is not going to go away and it is only going to
become a more serious and substantial challenge," says Mingay.
Few IT directors today are aware of how much energy their
datacentres consume, because procurement is usually dealt with by a
central body, such as facilities management, and power and cooling
requirements tend not to be monitored. But Roy Illsley, senior
research analyst at Butler Group, says the situation is likely to
become more pressing.
IT's growing carbon footprint
The IT and communications industry generates about 2% of global
CO2 emissions, which puts it on a par with aviation, according to
Gartner, with datacentres accounting for a rapidly growing 23% of
this. PCs and monitors, meanwhile, are responsible for 40% of
emissions, although growth is not as swift.
As demand for oil keeps growing and supplies start to dwindle,
energy bills will continue to rise, and taking action will become
an increasing priority. At the very least, says Illsley, it is
likely to lead to an increased emphasis on remote or home working
because of rising travel costs.
So what can IT departments do about all this and what role do
they have to play?
On the one hand, says Davis, they can go for "quick wins". These
include simple measures such as encouraging staff to unplug mobile
phone chargers or other equipment when not in use, and IT
departments can look at power-saving technology, such as 1E's
Nightwatchman agent-based system.
This makes pre-timed overnight checks to establish which PCs are
still running, before shutting them down safely or generating
exception reports so that suitable action can be taken at a later
date.
Another option is to use virtualisation software. Illsley says
that desktop virtualisation systems, which reside on a back-end
server but provide each user with a personalised image of their
desktop, can generate power savings of £78,000 a year for every
1,000 PCs. Consolidating 250 dual-core servers down to 25 using
virtualisation software can provide power and cooling savings of
about £140,000.
A holistic approach
Although measures to tackle energy use in the datacentre are
worthy activities, Mingay says the datacentre is only part of the
problem.
To tackle the issue of environmental sustainability effectively,
IT departments need to consider more than how much energy is going
through the electricity meter on the wall of the datacentre.
To go beyond mere "green-washing", it is important to look at
two other key areas in terms of energy efficiency, says Mingay. The
first relates to the energy consumed during the lifecycle of
equipment, which ranges from the use of raw materials in the
production process to disposal at end of life.
In IT only about 20% of total energy use occurs when equipment
is turned on, which is where eco-labels and procurement standards
come in, such as the Electronic Product Environmental Assessment
Tool, whereby products are registered as conforming with the
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers 1680-defined
environmental criteria.
Another consideration here, says Mingay, is to simply "use less
stuff" where possible.
The second area where IT has a role to play, is in using
technology to improve the energy-efficiency of the wider business.
A key concept here is de-materialisation, or digitising data to
reduce the consumption of material resources. A classic example of
de-materialisation is the music world's move from CD to MP3 and
digital downloads.
In the business arena this might include banks no longer sending
paper statements to customers, while providing a suitable
infrastructure to ensure that they do not just print them off
themselves, thus simply shifting the carbon burden.
Other options include introducing collaboration and
videoconferencing systems to reduce the need for business-related
travel.
Sun Microsystems, for example, has saved "significant" amounts
of money by introducing a policy whereby 65% of its employees work
flexibly. This means that they work from home for three days a week
and hotdesk at the office for the rest of the time, facilitated by
tools such as teleconferencing.
IT can also be used to optimise practices in areas such as
supply chain management, logistics operations and manufacturing
processes, while at the same time reducing the use of resources
such as packaging.
For this to take place it is crucial that business managers at
the highest level adopt a strategic, co-ordinated approach to embed
green policies into the organisational culture. If CIOs are not
given the support of the business, their efforts are likely to
remain fragmented and limited in scope and impact.
Mingay says, "If the business does not get it, there is only a
limited amount that CIOs can do, but it is worth bearing in mind
that they are just as capable as anyone else of bringing the
environmental agenda to attention and of persuading peers of the
strategic risks and opportunities that climate change
presents."