Proposals are invited for virtual presentations at the Sustainability Virtual Summits scheduled for March, September and November of 2010. The three summits will focus on sustainability issues pertaining to the Information and Communications Technology, Smart Business Operations and Smart Infrastructure sectors respectively. Presentation proposals may include new ideas, technologies, strategies, practical outcomes, research and case studies in line with conference themes. All three events are global in scope and participation as an attendee is free of charge. They will feature virtual exhibitions, conferences and keynote speeches in order to save travel time and eliminate associated greenhouse gas emissions.
The Department of Energy is awarding $47 million to support the development of new technologies and knowhow aimed at improving energy efficiency in the information technology (IT) and communication technology sectors. Energy Secretary Steven Chu announced that 14 projects across the country will share in this award. Information technology and telecommunications are vital and rapidly growing sectors of our overall economy and will become even more central as the smart grid is deployed. As our country increasingly comes to rely on an information economy in sector after sector the underlying physical infrastructure that supports it, such as the data centers, networks, routers and so forth, is expected to continue to rapidly grow.
If you’re like most small-medium sized business owners, you own and independently operate a business with less than 100 employees, have revenues of less than $500,000 annually, and are not market dominant. You may be wondering if the new, ‘greener’ technologies can work for your company. Can your business enjoy the same benefits as your larger counter-parts by investing in ‘green’ technologies such as virtualization? The global economic downturn means that it is more important than ever to ensure that every penny counts and that your business is run efficiently and cost effectively. This post will (hopefully) help you to identify whether your company can benefit from implementing virtualization technology while reducing your environmental impact.
Last week, IBM announced a collaboration with Metropolitan Community College (MCC) in Omaha, Nebraska, to develop a first-of-its-kind green data center management degree using IBM hardware, software and online skills training resources. The two-year associates degree includes courses to help students gain technical and business skills to prepare them for careers in the design and management of energy efficient data centers.
For our readers in the New York area who are interested in the subject of green data center design the Green Grid is hosting an exclusive high level industry discussion in New York, NY on October 2nd, 2009. The event will feature a prominent industry discussion and forum on green data center design.
The Green Grid is a consortium of many of the world’s leading tech and telecom companies with the goal of promoting efficient green data center designs and technologies that use less energy and water as well as recycle the computing and support equipment used by data centers.
Each year, Brown-Wilson Group and Black Book Research undertakes an annual survey of outsourcing service providers’ green initiatives from the perspective of their client experience. These research results represent an extensive and representative perception study of outsourcing vendors, validated by 1,338 unique company respondents from service users around the globe earlier this year. Over 7,000 individual nominations were received during the survey. They surveyed outsourcing buyer CIOs, governance, buyers, user managers &
corporate executives uncovered both the progress of suppliers and to determine who are the cream of the crop when it comes to Green IT. Xerox topped the list, followed by Accenture, CSC, Capgemini and IBM Global.
A recent global survey of 10,000 people in 21 countries reveals that most have a guilty conscience about their carbon footprint when using their home and office technology. However, the majority of respondents cannot identify their largest potential environmental impact points when it comes to printing, and that women are more knowledgeable and guilt-ridden about their green practices than men. The Lexmark sponsored study revealed a number of surprising results. Eight-five percent would often choose the most environmentally conscious printing option if given a “one-click” or “one-push” solution and 84 percent are more likely to buy a product if the manufacturer shows more responsibility and concern regarding recycling. Seventy-Five percent reported feeling guilty about printing unnecessary pages. Despite the high level of environmental consciousness, 64 percent INCORRECTLY think that the disposal of ink cartridges is the largest cause of pollution from printing.
The first wave of green IT solutions failed to make sustainability benefits tangible according to a new study conducted on the sector by the independent research firm Verdantix. However, innovative IT sustainability solutions just released into the market or on the horizon for 2010 – will quickly demonstrate the tech sector’s role in supporting corporate sustainability strategies.
This is an article devoted to the idea that a revolution in software design is needed in order to produce software –or as insiders often refer to it: the code – that is both greener itself and that is designed to help other systems and products become greener… i.e. more energy and resource efficient, less wasteful, more adaptive to current conditions.
There are two often intertwined paths to follow, both of which are important for this discussion. Code itself needs to become greener; using virtual resources more efficiently and thus using fewer hardware resources and less power to accomplish the same computing tasks. Code should also be designed with a feature set that enables other products, running the code, to use less energy and to be able to time shift their energy requirements to off peak periods.
