Environment
The IT and the carbon footprint
Which of the following data centre approaches better helps your company demonstrate a smaller greenhouse gas (GHG - CO2 and CO2 equivalent) footprint?
This is something that is set to be the next topic of debate in the near future. Two key issues:
- How we measure data center or IT carbon footprint
- Who pays the cost of this? IT or the end user - but what about the out sourced IT - who declares the carbon footprint, by supplying the IT is it my cost or the end users?
Energy efficient data center is good business
The Energy Department can save millions of dollars per year by consolidating data centers managed by contractors, according to an inspector general report released this week.
The report estimates that Energy could save at least $2.3 million annually by using more efficient hardware technologies and consolidating servers at the six data centers audited. The department spent $331 million in fiscal 2007 operating similar centers that house technology and networking hardware to support critical functions.
Check out this article talking about how the energy efficient data center could be the next thing to think about, an interesting read. I wonder if we will see the link between this and the carbon footprint of the data center?
HP continues the innovation
PALO ALTO, Calif., Nov 03, 2008 (BUSINESS WIRE) — HP (HPQ:37.82, -0.79, -2.0%) today broadened its Green Business Technology initiative with additions to its HP Thermal Logic portfolio that include power-capping server technologies and energy-efficiency services designed to reduce costs and extend the life of data centers.
In traditional data centers, customers invest millions in capital expenditures to create a redundant power infrastructure that maximizes uptime. Additionally, to ensure power availability, IT administrators overprovision server energy.
Check out the article, it also mentions using HP’s Dynamic Power Capping too be more efficient in the data center, anything we can do to improve energy efficiency, to give the end user more control has to be a good thing, and could be ideal where we have systems we know don’t necessarily need to be running at full power.
Microsoft and virtualization a few thoughts
For companies using virtual servers to run critical applications, live migration is highly desirable, since it lets data centers swap running instances of critical virtual servers between physical systems with zero downtime.
VMware has live migration, but Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) doesn’t, and won’t until its next release of Windows Server 2008, due in 2010. When Microsoft officially launched its virtualization products recently, Bob Muglia, senior VP of Microsoft’s server and tools business, downplayed the importance of the feature, which in the VMware product lineup is called VMotion. “There is no magic in VMotion. It’s just a feature, and we’ll have that feature in the next release,” Muglia said.
I remain excited about what Microsoft can offer in the virtualization space, simply because the more vendors we have in the virtualization space, the more choice we have for the end user, the more innovation and healthy competition. That the end user can choose the platform that works for them, for their operating environment, that provides the empowerment they need is crucial, everything else is noise. The more users we bring online to this new virtual world, the more we can transform the way we deliver IT for the better, the more we can empower our business environmentally and operationally.
Talking data centers
The next time you use Google, think of the vast amounts of power data centres use – 20 times that of a normal office. Stephen Kennett looks at what companies are doing to prune their consumption
Can a data centre ever be green? Although from the outside these nerve centres of today’s digital world might appear like little more than glorified industrial sheds, they in fact consume colossal amounts of energy. Stuffed full of the computer servers that provide the lifeblood of financial institutions and our demand for instant internet access, a typical data centre requires a power load in the range of 20-40MW, 15 to 20 times that of a typical office. But last year worldwide emissions from data centres topped 170 million tonnes of carbon and there’s little sign of it peaking. By 2020 they are predicted to quadruple, outstripping those of the airline industries.
This insatiable thirst for energy is beginning to attract the attention of US and European governments, with steps being taken to introduce legislation to curb consumption. However, some clients and operators are now developing what they claim to be green data centres. One is an Arup Associates-designed data centre in Frankfurt for financial giant Citi, which could be the first to achieve a LEED Platinum rating.
Check out this article about data center power utilization, it’s an interesting read and a topic of conversation that’s ongoing in Europe amongst other regions. Related to data center power is your data center carbon footprint and your operating costs, granted you as an end user might not be concerned about the amount of carbon generated or power used to provide your IT infrastructure, but consider that these costs are billed directly or in-directly to you. Simply adjusting the infrastructure setup, refreshing hardware, looking at your service level agreements or how you procure and provision your IT can reduce your environmental impact, the ability for your IT to deliver and your operating costs.
Who’s using all the green power?
The offers are tempting for any self-respecting green. For a small premium, or sometimes no premium at all, you can make sure that only clean, green, renewable electricity comes down the grid into your home. But what do you get for your money? Does the planet really benefit? Is this greenwash?
Most of us are not foolish enough to suppose that our electricity supplier specially packages up “green energy” for us, and shoves it down the wires. We just get regular electricity, of course. But most of us would suppose that if we pay a green tariff, someone somewhere generates more renewable energy – and burns less fossil fuel - than they would if we hadn’t done our bit for the environment.
Check out this interesting article about green energy. I posted this because one of my friends in the data center space had been complaining that the cost and availability of ‘green energy’ is becoming a thing for him. That as more people think about the carbon footprint of their data center, of carbon neutrality, more people are buying green energy increasing the costs. We’ll have to see, an interesting read nonetheless.
HP unveils renewable energy initiatives
HP today unveiled renewable energy initiatives in its facilities, research and products to support a new goal to double the company’s global purchases of renewable power from under 4 percent in 2008 to 8 percent by 2012.
This complements HP’s goal to reduce energy consumption and the resulting greenhouse gas emissions from HP-owned and HP-leased facilities worldwide to 16 percent below 2005 levels by 2010.
To reduce its carbon footprint, HP is relying on diversified renewable energy resources, improving energy efficiency and placing a strong emphasis on energy reduction and optimization at a number of its facilities around the world.
In 2007, HP successfully met its goal to increase renewable energy purchases by more than 350 percent and purchased 61.4 million kilowatt hours (kwh) of renewable energy and renewable energy credits in the United States.
“HP is investing in technologies that bring us closer to operating in a sustainable IT ecosystem,” said John Frey, senior sustainability executive, HP. “We are supporting renewable energy programs for our own operational efficiency, harnessing research to demonstrate environmental leadership and offering products that support customer concerns about rising energy costs.”
Check out this article which is talking about the steps HP has been taking to reduce its environmental impact and also illustrates how it is using renewable energy and other technologies/processes to reduce its corporate carbon footprint. It’s always good to see how people are using the technology, and in some cases making small changes that can very efficiently reduce their carbon footprint and their operational costs.
Data center to use renewable energy
Hundreds of jobs and heat for Prince Charles’ organic business in Caithness have been identified as spin offs from a proposed green energy project.
Tidal power developer Atlantis Resources Corporation confirmed it was considering a site near Castle of Mey for a computer data centre.
The plan - still in the early stages - would see the centre powered by a tidal scheme in the Pentland Firth.
US financial giant Morgan Stanley is a major shareholder in Atlantis.
In an exclusive, Atlantis told BBC Scotland there were potential benefits from the project in terms of employment and Charles-inspired organic and local produce business, Mey Selections.
As we become increasingly interested in the cost of electricity (and cooling) to power the data center, as well as the concept of the corporate carbon footprint, using renewable energy could be ideal as part of a range of technologies and best practice to being more efficient in the data center. Using technologies like fresh air cooling, solar panels on the roof, allowing the data center to run a little hotter, with a lights out configuration could reduce your carbon footprint, and your operational costs. Check it out, an interesting read.
Green IT the enabler of your business
I just got back from a conference on “Green IT,” with a primary focus on the ways in which server consolidation and virtualization can reduce power consumption in our industry. When I say “our industry,” I’m referring to information technology in general, though, and not ed tech.
In the business world, data centers and server rooms consume extraordinary amounts of power. In fact, the cost of running servers over their lifecycle is now exceeding their acquisition costs. Data center power consumption is a huge cost center for large organizations, but what about the average school district? How many servers are you running? Two, three, ten?
Green IT remains a concept that can deliver real benefits in terms of finance and in operations, getting it right for your business might not represent significant changes or investment. Even simple things like switching off the screensaver, powering down the pc or using more energy efficient computers can deliver instant and effective results. It would be great to see how we could use virtualization and combine it with a green IT project to not only deliver the functionality, the IT service but do so in an environmentally and cost efficient way to highlight the possibilities.
Verari is a finalist in Clean Technology awards
SAN DIEGO, Oct 07, 2008 (BUSINESS WIRE) — Verari Systems, a premier developer of independent blade-based computing and storage platforms for the data center with the highest density, availability, and energy efficiency in the market, today announced it is a finalist in the 15th Annual AeA San Diego Council’s High Tech Awards. Chosen in the “Clean Technology Category” for its FOREST Container solution, Verari was one of the first in the industry to engineer and deliver a solution that packages high density storage and compute blades with self-contained cooling into a portable data center that can be shipped virtually anywhere.
“The fact that Verari Systems was founded on the principle of ‘thinking green’ and defining a new era in high performance utility computing for the enterprise data center, makes the company an ideal finalist for the AeA High Tech Awards in the Clean Technology Category,” said Kevin Carroll, executive director, AeA San Diego Council. “It is companies such as Verari Systems that advance the San Diego region’s position as a center for technology innovation.”
Well done to Verari for the recognition of their technology. It’s great to see more people talking about green technology. We need to manage the environmental message with the business impacts, financial/operational, that I have the right answers to the ‘first line’ questions about why the technology might work for me is the first step to improving adoption and innovation of the platform.
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