Making computing a little bit greener
As some of you may know, I am the managing director of a software development company called Codefounders and have spent my entire career associated with high-tech industry. I love technology and software development in particular but this is one of the things that does not sit happily with my environmentally-friendly outlook on life; the computing industry is not particularly green by any measure. Not only does it involve large amounts of short-lived, electronic hardware created from highly toxic substances such as arsenic and lead but the IT industry uses a phenomenal amount of electric energy. Most of this energy is generated by burning fossil fuels and consequently the IT industry is a major contributor to the emission of greenhouses gases. Some recent estimates suggest that the IT industry is responsible for 2% of the overall carbon emissions, which puts it on a par with the aviation industry.
Over the last 18 months or so there has been a lot of interest in making datacentres and the hardware used in them more environmentally friendly and less energy-intensive through initiatives such as the Climate Savers Computing initiative and the efforts of hardware and software vendors such as IBM and Microsoft. It is encouraging to see some of the major players in the industry starting to use more renewable energy for powering their own IT operations; for instance Google are investing in renewable energy research and technologies.
Whilst this focus on making datacentres more green is commendable and a step in the right direction I think all users of IT can do more to reduce their impact on the environment. Admittedly a large proportion of energy consumption and carbon emissions are associated with datacentres but I suspect there are more desktop client computers out there than there are servers in datacentres. At this time there is very little focus on what can be done to reduce the environmental impact of desktop computers, particularly with regard to their power consumption. There are a number of software applications available which can help businesses reduce their energy costs by turning off unused computers. Unfortunately most of these are either extremely expensive and focussed particularly at large-scale enterprises, or are simplistic client-side applications which are difficult to manage in a network environment. Some do little more than tweak the operating system power settings and I believe a much more pro-active approach is required to make users take responsibility for the costs, both environmental and financial, of their computer usage.
In many organisations desktop computers are left running 24 hours a day, 7 days a week but are only actually in use for a fraction of that time. In some cases this is required to support automated backup and maintenance policies but I suspect that in many cases users cannot be bothered waiting for their computer to boot up each time they want to use it and leave it turned on all the time so that it is always available and ready for use when they require it. It was this realisation, coupled with my own desire to try to make computing more green, that has led Codefounders to develop its Powerdown application. Powerdown is a software application which ensures that computers are turned off when not required but are always available when users want to use them. Unlike other similar products Powerdown is centrally managed but operates entirely on the client computer which makes it suitable for all companies, from one-man businesses with no network all the way through to large multi-national corporations. It also continues to operate even when computers are disconnected from the network (e.g. standalone computers, laptops) which allows greater energy savings to be achieved.
Doubtlessly I'll say more about Powerdown in future blog posts. In the meantime, if you are looking for ways to reduce the energy costs and environmental impact of your desktop computers users please take a look at our website and and download a free evaluation copy of Powerdown. Take a look at the offerings from our competitors too and make sure that you get
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