Green IT & Green Hosting

Failing the Green Dream

16/06/10

An extensive survey of government departments, agencies and local authorities has revealed that little, if any, ‘baselining’ of the environmental impact of IT has been undertaken prior to the implementation of ‘green IT’ initiatives. The research focused on metropolitan, borough, city and district councils within England, Wales & Scotland, with a questionnaire sent to the head of ICT at each council.

According to Robin Pearson, sales and communications director at Greenwise-IT, a provider of green IT consultancy & training that undertook the research: ”Our experience has shown that, in order to justify the time, effort and money spent on any green IT initiative, you must be able to demonstrate real and meaningful benefits. To do this, it is absolutely essential that you first fully understand and quantify your present situation - ie, the starting point must always be a baseline assessment of the present situation.”

Greenwise-IT says that, to be truly meaningful, an IT carbon footprint assessment must include more than simply Tier 1 emissions (energy consumed directly by IT equipment). It must also embrace Tier 2 (emissions related to IT support activities), and Tier 3 (emissions relating to energy consumed in the hardware lifecycle) emissions). “Only by including the Tier 2 and Tier 3 emissions can you develop an IT carbon footprint that is truly reflective of all IT related energy consumption,” adds Pearson.

Has ‘green’ been overhyped? Is everyone getting too excited about the effects of global warming? Or are we already beyond the point of no return. Brian Wall reports


Energy use in IT, like all other technology-intensive industries, has now become an area of intense scrutiny. Computer hardware and software vendors, recognising that there are rich rewards to be had by appearing to be ‘green’, have flooded the market with so-called green products.

With so much ‘greenwash’ out there, it’s little wonder that many organisations have become sceptical of green technology, not because of any indifference to the plight of the environment, but because they are not at all sure who to trust. Which green products and solutions really are green? And, even if you are sure of the authenticity of the environmental claims being made by certain vendors on behalf of their own particular offerings, how sure can you be that they are operating within a green supply chain?

The problem that many encounter in the drive to be carbon neutral is one of being able to separate out all of the product hype from reality. "There is a lot of hype and it's hard to discern the difference between things that have been 'green-washed' and things that are really green IT," says industry research company Forrester’s analyst James Staten. Many vendors also like to "shine up" old products and sell them with a green tag, which makes it all the more deceiving, he adds.

Some IT vendors might be following in the tyre tracks of those self-congratulatory car companies that proudly and loudly boast about selling eco-friendly cars, while at the same time plugging the joys of millions of petrol-ravenous SUVs. Staten cites, for example, one major vendor that runs lots of advertising focusing on the greenness of its servers and PCs. And while its blade servers are indeed very efficient, he notes, they “are not a whole lot different than other people's". Vendors, he adds, have a tendency to say: "If you want to go green, you have to go with all my products. I wouldn't point fingers at one. I think everybody's guilty of this."

COMPLEX AND CONFUSING Certainly, the quest to be green can be a complex and often confusing process. Most organisations are acutely aware of their own spiralling energy costs and want to keep these as low as possible, which means embracing the right IT solutions to maximise efficiency. A natural consequence of that – and one that many have now formally built into their corporate social responsibility (CSR) charters – is to be green, and be seen to be green. That means not only demonstrating the efficacy of their own policies and behaviour, but equally showing they operate in a supply chain where green is also in full flow, upstream and downstream


Of course, apart from CSR, there is, added to the mix, another compelling reason to be green: the punitive Carbon Reduction Commitment legislation that is now in full force. This has seen the introduction of league tables that not only penalise those businesses that fail to achieve their green targets, but also expose them to the harsh glare of public scrutiny. Those laggards who cannot meet their carbon reduction targets will be widely exposed and may find themselves out of favour when investment decisions are made by their peers about where to procure IT solutions.

ENERGY-SAPPING STATS The battle to control energy consumption is accelerating meanwhile, which mean the quest for green solutions will only intensify. In the US, for example, data centres consumed less than 1% of total US electricity use in 2000, but that will rise to at least 2.3% of all electricity used nationwide this year, according to the Uptime Institute. Figures in other parts of the world are comparable.

IT departments therefore share a huge task to implement the changes that will reverse this worrying trend. Derek Kober, director of the BPM Forum, says most IT professionals and executives are genuinely concerned about their IT departments’ impact on the environment – or are at least interested in the economic benefits of being more energy efficient. Yet in a BPM Forum survey, while 86% of respondents said IT organisations have a "responsibility to substantially improve efficiency and green activities”, only 41% had any specific green plans in place. "The biggest overarching message,” Kober states, “was that, despite concern and despite increasing priorities for improving the environment and greening the data centre, IT departments in general are pretty far behind."

Some IT shops view green technology as too expensive upfront, but Kober notes that many businesses save money in the long run by consolidating systems and replacing old processors with newer, more energy-efficient, models. Because of these long-term savings, economic benefit, rather than environmental concern, is the initial driver that gets IT departments thinking about efficiency, he concludes.

HARD THINKING
Forrester's Staten shares this take, saying that IT administrators define green from the hard currency perspective, rather than something that is environmental. "They don't really make a lot of decisions around what's environmentally responsible or not." In its last quarterly review, ‘Green progress in enterprise IT’, research conducted by Forrester showed that 38% of enterprises now include respect for the environment among their evaluation criteria and 55% of them put cost reduction at the top of their list of priorities.

At the same time, while green IT has become a very topical subject, it seems there are a range of views about what constitutes ‘green IT’. On the one hand, there is the argument that it is primarily a bottom-line focused activity that also helps save the planet. On the other hand, there is the view that almost every new initiative nowadays has been ‘greenwashed’ and that not nearly enough is being done to actually improve our planet’s condition.

Separating green facts from green fiction often results in inaction. There are many myths that have built up around green and carbon neutrality that can deter businesses, such as:
.
 Small changes don't matter
 ‘Green’ choices are painful and expensive
 Keeping old technology is ‘greener’ than buying new ones
 There's only one ‘right’ answer to your eco dilemma.

LIMITED PROGRESS According to the preliminary findings of a survey conducted by research organisation Redemtech, companies are making only limited progress towards evolving corporate IT programmes that are more sustainable. Its ‘Sustainable Computing Assessment’ benchmarks organisations against best practices in five areas: productivity, reuse, accountability, energy and environmental social responsibility. A score of 75% or better in each category indicates a ‘mature’ green IT programme. The reality is that scores averaged between 32% and 37%.

According to Redemtech, the initial results of the assessment show that most companies lack holistic policies for promoting all four cornerstones of sustainable computing: extended lifecycles, energy efficiency, utilisation and reuse, and responsible recycling. “Even companies with coherent policies lack the governance needed to ensure that operations are aligned with the sustainability priorities of the business, according to the assessment findings," Redemtech comments.

The highest scores on the survey were for energy efficiency, which has been an area of intense focus for IT professionals and manufacturers in recent years. Companies with more than 100,000 employees tended to score the highest, with average results in the 40% range for the five categories. Companies with fewer than 500 employees scored lowest. Based on the survey results, Redemtech suggests that companies take five steps to make their green computing programmes more sustainable:

• Establish a baseline, then set quantitative sustainability targets
• Review and revise policies. Sound policies create the foundation for sustainable computing, communicate executive level support, and form the basis for standardised operational procedures and consistent execution.
• Extend desktop and laptop lifecycles. Creating the systems and relationships required to support longer lifecycles will deliver long-term improvements in IT financial and environmental performance
• Optimise utilisation. Maintaining a proper inventory of surplus systems can reduce procurement costs and increase agility, but maintaining too large an inventory means assets are sitting idle for extended periods, losing value.
• Create accountability through good governance. Without metrics, there is no way to measure performance and consequently no way to optimise programmes, quantify benefits or recognise personnel for their performance in this area.

"In this climate, green IT has to be about more than presenting a nice picture to the market or senior management,” comments Redemtech president Robert Houghton. “It has to be sustainable, both environmentally and financially. That requires applying the same processes and discipline to these programmes as are used in other areas of the business."

A view that is echoed by Phil Worms, Director Corporate Communications, iomart Hosting when he states: “I have always been a little uncomfortable about businesses promoting their green credentials as a badge of honour, particularly those who use such emotive claims as being totally carbon neutral. We’re in danger of presenting schemes such as carbon offsetting as ‘magic bullets’ that will prevent further climate change or a solution to the emissions problem.”

“We can all work towards a greener IT environment if we challenge our existing behaviours. We need to consider how we use our raw energy more intelligently and how we can maximise the potential of our existing IT infrastructures so that we make some inroads. Areas such as use of renewables, virtualisation, cloud computing and teleconferencing all have a role to play. We need to analyse our processes to seek the double whammy of reducing emissions whilst delivering tangible fiscal benefit to the business.”

“I do believe that a by product of sound business practice will be a ‘greener’ IT department.”

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