Sabre Holdings - best aviation carbon calculator

A report by Dr Christian Jardine of the Environmental Change Institute (ECI) at Oxford University's Centre for the Environment has concluded that the air emissions carbon calculator from Sabre Holdings is “the most detailed aviation carbon calculator in existence”.

It seems that calculating aviation emissions is a complex process, having to take into account a series of factors, including (among other things) the plane type, the engine type, seating configuration and freight load. The report, entitled 'Calculating the Carbon Dioxide Emissions of Flights', looked at calculation methodologies from Defra (the UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs), the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO - a UN agency), ClimateCare (an aviation carbon calculator developed in conjunction with ECI) and Sabre Holdings. Sabre came out on top - full details are here.

For those who don't know, Sabre Holdings merchandises and retails travel products and provides distribution and technology solutions for the travel industry. Its offerings include an online travel service, a global distribution system connecting travellers with travel agents and a range of decision-support tools, reservations systems and consulting services for airlines.

It just goes to show that there are a lot of opportunities for niche solutions providers to make their mark in green IT. At the moment much of the development of methodologies and standards is at an early stage, led by public sector bodies, giving commercial enterprises plenty of room to innovate. And you have to believe that at some point in the future every airline will need to be running software like this and will eventually be competing to show how accurate and detailed the figures are.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Telefónica and Vodafone to share network infrastructure

In a pan-European collaboration, Telefónica and Vodafone have agreed to share network infrastructure in Germany, Spain, Ireland and the UK with detailed discussions going on in the Czech Republic. The companies expect to save hundreds of millions of pounds over the next 10 years through the agreement, which will also have significant environmental savings through consolidation of existing sites and joint build of new sites.

The actions by country are:

* Germany - Both companies to share existing 2G and 3G sites. Shared masts can also be used for microwave backhaul.

* Ireland - Both companies to open all network sites for sharing by the other party. New build will also be conducted jointly where roll-out plans are aligned.

* Spain - Both companies to extend existing site share agreement from 2007, which includes the shared usage of power, cabinets and mast. To date 2,200 sites are shared under this agreement. During 2009 and 2010 additional sites will be included.

* UK - Both companies to focus on joint build of new sites and consolidation of existing 2G and 3G sites.

More details are in the press release here.

This seems like the sort of win-win situation that we will increasingly see over the coming years. The telecoms sector is a great place for such collaboration, since there are enormous potential savings to be made from sharing infrastructure. It does mean, though, that differentiation will increasingly depend on customer services. You need to be sure your CRM and billing systems are as good as your rivals' and that you have some innovative value-added services to offer, since the basic service delivery will be one shade of vanilla.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Ricoh joins Eco-Patent Commons

Ricoh has joined the Eco-Patent Commons, an initiative coordinated by the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) in which participants pledge environmentally beneficial patents to the public domain. Ricoh's contribution is a technology that allows cartridges to be recycled safely by counting the number of times of use and alerting a user if a cartridge exceeds its duration limit.

Eco-Patent Commons was launched by IBM, Nokia, Pitney Bowes and Sony in partnership with the WBCSD based on a the commitment that anyone who wants to bring environmental benefits to market can use these patents to protect the environment and enable collaboration between businesses that foster new innovations. Almost a hundred eco-friendly patents have been pledged by nine companies, in a variety of industries, since the initiative was launched in January 2008.

Björn Stigson, president of the WBCSD. “By making their patents available in this way, companies are helping in areas such as energy efficiency and conservation, waste reduction and recycling. These latest pledges show that, even in financially difficult times, business has a strong commitment to contributing to a sustainable world.”

Member companies and the WBCSD invite other interested companies to become members of the Eco-Patent Commons and participate in this initiative promoting innovation and collaboration to help protect the planet.

Do it now.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

ITU proposes carbon counting standards

A focus group from the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) has proposed a standardised methodology for reporting greenhouse gas emissions in the ICT industry. The ITU-T Focus Group on ICTs and Climate Change has developed a method for calculating two elements:

- The energy usage and carbon impact arising from ICT lifecycles

- The decrease in GHG emissions that can be achieved through 'dematerialisation', i.e. doing things electronically rather than physically.

The meeting agreed on a set of four deliverables based on best practice from its members, including terms and definitions, initially to be published as the proceedings of the Focus Group and then as ITU-T Recommendations or standards.

Malcolm Johnson, Director of ITU’s Telecommunication Standardization Bureau is quoted in the press release as saying “This work has an important bearing on current and future global agreements under which countries undertake commitments to reduce their overall GHG emissions. Common approaches to calculating the impact of ICTs are vital to ensure coherent and effective solutions.”

He's absolutely right, but the danger is that a number of independent organisations come up with their own sets of standards and methodologies. For instance, only a week or so ago we reported that the Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions (ATIS) had published standards for determining telecommunication equipment’s energy efficiency. The best thing would be if these industry organisations got together to discuss their findings. Multiple sets of rival standards are not much better than no standards at all.

Incidentally, the ITU is organising the third Symposium on ICTs and Climate Change in Quito, Ecuador, on 8-10 July 2009.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Accenture forms Intelligent City Network

Despite my last post, the focus on smart grids continues. Accenture has brought together utilities and city authorities around the world committed to smart grids into what it calls the Intelligent City Network. The idea is for utility executives and city leaders to swap knowledge and experience on the planning and use of smart-grid technology and help formulate blueprints and standards for implementation.

Members include US company Xcel Energy, East China Grid Co., a Chinese transmission company; Russian Interregional Distribution Grid Company of Centre (MRSK of Centre), Dutch utility Alliander N.V. and the City of Amsterdam.

David Rouls, managing director of the transmission & distribution practice in Accenture’s Utilities industry group, said, “The implementation of ‘intelligent’ solutions such as smart grids is complex, requiring a utility and a city to collaborate at various levels on the strategy, technology, infrastructure, governance and transformation approaches needed”. From my comments yesterday it looks like security should be in there somewhere as well.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Smart grid security scare

To put a damper on the promises of smart grid technology, which I've reported on frequently, US company IOActive, a specialist in smart grid security services, has said that it has found significant security issues in smart grid platforms. Although already in use by utilities in the US and around the world, the company says it could expose countries to attacks on power infrastructure. (Full details are in a press release here).

The company cites industry research that points to (and I quote) "vulnerabilities such as protocol tampering, buffer overflows, persistent, and non-persistent rootkits and code propagation". The net result could be loss of control of smart meter devices to third parties. The company goes on to say that if security is not addressed at the design and implementation stage it may prove cost prohibitive to address them once the devices are deployed.

The research is particularly addressed at the US and in a presentation to the Committee of Homeland Security and DHS on March 16, 2009, the President and CEO of IOActive stated: “The smart grid infrastructure promises to deliver significant benefits for many generations, but first we need to address its inherent security flaws. Based on our research and the ability to easily introduce serious threats, IOActive believes that the relative security immaturity of the smart grid and AMI (Advanced Metering Infrastructure) markets warrants the adoption of proven industry best practices including the requirement of independent third-party security assessments of all smart grid technologies that are being proposed for deployment in the Nation’s critical infrastructure. We are also recommending that the smart grid industry follow a proven formal Security Development Lifecycle, as exemplified by Microsoft’s Trustworthy Computing initiative of 2001, to guide and govern the future development of smart grid technologies.”


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

PC power waste

1E and the Alliance to Save Energy have released the latest version of the PC Energy Report, based on a survey by Harris Interactive. The research covers the US, UK and Germany and you can see the reports for each country here.

When asked why they power down at the end of the day, the most significant differences were between the numbers citing environmental reasons. This was much more the case in the UK (27%) compared with 17% in Germany and just 10% in the US. In the US, though, significantly more people seem to believe that powering down is necessary for the proper running of a PC. I'm not sure why that is, but at least it achieves the same end.



In terms of why they don't power down, there was less divergence between countries. The main reasons were that other people use the PC (c20%), it automatically goes into sleep mode (c18%) and it takes too long (15%).

The report found that the proportion of the workers in each country using PCs was similar - 74% in the US, 78% in the UK and 79% in Germany, equating to 108 million people in the US, 17 million in the UK and 31 million in Germany. (I have some serious reservations about these employee numbers - 78% of the UK workforce must be higher than 17 million in a population of 60 million plus).

Anyway, the reports also estimate the cost to each country of not powering down; $2.8bn to the US, £300m to the UK and €919m to Germany. So if you convert the currencies and use the employee estimates in the report it means that in the UK and the US each employee that uses a PC will waste $26 in electricity in 2009, whilst in Germany the figure is $40 (mainly due to the higher cost of electricity in Germany).


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Business Continuity Management report 2009

The Chartered Management Institute in the UK has released the latest of its annual reports into Business Continuity Management, sponsored by the UK Cabinet Office. Called 'A Decade of Living Dangerously' it looks at the ability of the UK as a nation to respond to disruptive challenges. A total of 1,012 survey responses were received from the Institute's members. The full report is here.

BCM is a part of the UK’s formal preparations for the possible threats posed to business, whether from internal systems failures or external emergencies such as extreme weather, terrorism, or infectious disease. Hence it has a role to play in addressing the inevitable impacts of climate change. The Civil Contingencies Act 2004 required front line organisations to maintain BCM arrangements and since May 2006 local authorities have been required to promote BCM to business and voluntary organisations. BCM is enshrined in BS 25999-1, the British Standards Institution’s Code of Practice for Business Continuity Management.

It's interesting to see how possible climate change impacts are being considered and addressed. The UK government has made an assessment of various potential risks and the survey looked at how concerned managers were about them.



Electronic attacks tops the list, followed by disease and severe weather. Flooding was separately identified and ranked fifth. The survey indicated a high level of disruption due to extreme weather incidents, such as flood or high winds, with 25% of respondents having been disrupted in 2009, slightly lower than in 2007 and 2008 but substantially higher than in previous years (and the survey was conducted before the heavy snowfall, flooding and utility outages across the UK in February 2009).

In terms of the perception of threats, the second highest increase over the last 10 years is in extreme weather, with the level of concern increasing by 144%, outpacing even fear of terrorist damage. Interestingly, the largest increase in threat is seen as from pressure group protest. (Arguably, the threat from environmental pressure groups will be as much around damaging a company's image as physical damage to operations).


It's all relevant because one of the less discussed aspects of green IT is the requirement to build a business infrastructure that can withstand the potential threats from the long-term impacts of climate change. Many companies have business continuity systems in place, but they tend to be limited in scope, based on immediate and local threats. In a global business world the impact can be felt in a remote part of the supply chain or have indirect consequences in skills availability, etc. Hopefully we are a long way off, but businesses need to be prepared and IT can help build flexibility and redundancy into business operations.

The survey showed that the number of organisations with a Business Continuity Plan in place is 52%, up from 45% in 2002, so there's a long way to go. We will keep track of these reports as the years progress.



The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

The EPA declares greenhouses gasses are pollutants

According to The New York Times today the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is about to declare that greenhouse gasses are dangerous pollutants, opening the door to potential federal regulation of car emissions and heavy polluting power plants and factories.

It may sound odd, but despite the Supreme Court ordering the EPA (in 2007) to determine whether greenhouse gasses qualified as pollutants under the Clean Air Act, the Bush administration had stalled in complying with the order, opting for more study of the issue.

There was, apparently, wide consensus among EPA experts that carbon dioxide was a danger to the public and that there was scientific research to support it. However, not until the Obama administration took office (and appointed scientists to head the environmental team - rather than oil men) have they had the chance to say so.

According to the article the decision may also help the introduction of a federal law to curb carbon dioxide emissions, since many companies see legislation as less restrictive and more flexible than being monitored by a regulatory agency.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Green ICT in the EU

As we reported in January, the EU has been developing a Green ICT plan inspired by the Smart 2020 report which McKinsey produced for the Global e-Sustainability Initiative (GeSI) last June. The Commission has now published a paper which sets out the background to a Recommendation to be adopted by the Commission in the second half of 2009, after a public consultation. The Recommendation will set out measures to pave the way for ICTs to contribute to energy efficiency gains and emissions reductions across the economy, based on three main actions:

- The ICT sector will be invited to set itself targets and agreement on measurement methodologies of the energy consumption and carbon emissions of its processes

- Working partnerships between the ICT and other sectors will be encouraged to identify where and how ICTs can play a role in reducing emissions in those sectors

- Member states should be called upon to enable the EU-wide roll-out of ICT tools likely to trigger a shift in the behaviour of consumers, businesses and communities and to drive demand for ICT solutions to optimise the energy performance of their own operations.

The basis for the discussion is that the use of ICT equipment represents about 1.75% of carbon emissions in Europe with a further 0.25% coming from the production of ICT and consumer electronic equipment. As the range and penetration of ICTs increase, their overall energy use is growing. It is in the rest of the economy that the enabling capacity of ICTs is expected to make the greatest contribution to reducing emissions as well as cost savings. It falls into three main areas:

- Buildings and Construction. According to the paper, ICT-enabled systems can reduce the energy consumption of buildings in the EU by up to 17%.

- Transport and Logistics. Carbon emission in transport/logistics could be cut by up to 27%.

- Smart meters. Results from trials in a number of Member States show that using smart meters can lower energy consumption by up to 10%.


The paper comes at a time when the EU is looking to increase funding in ICT because the European industry does not seem to be pulling its weight in the world market, mainly because of teh fragmented nature of the market in Europe. A new ICT Research and Innovation Strategy put forward by the Commission calls on member states and industry to pool resources and work together more in ICT research and innovation. It also proposes that Europe should double its investments in ICT research and innovation over the next ten years. The Commission already plans to increase the annual ICT research funding from €1.1 billion in 2010 to €1.7 billion in 2013 and is looking to member startes to match the increase at national level.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Telecommunications energy efficiency ratio

The Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions (ATIS) has published three standards for determining telecommunication equipment’s energy efficiency. The standards introduce the Telecommunications Energy Efficiency Ratio (TEER) as a measure of network-element efficiency. ATIS is 'the leading technical planning and standards development organisation committed to the rapid development of global, market-driven standards for the information, entertainment and communications industry'.

The standards provide a methodology for measuring and reporting energy consumption and quantify a network component’s ratio of 'work performed' to energy consumed. The efficiency standards are specific to equipment type, network location and classification, but normalising by functionality enables like-for-like comparisons.

Currently there are three standards defining TEER’s General Requirements, Transport Equipment TEER, and Server Equipment TEER, but a lot more are expected, including routers, power rectifiers and wireless access equipment.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

AT&T to offer wireless smart metering technology

AT&T is working with SmartSynch, which provides IP-based smart grid solutions using public wireless networks, to offer wireless smart metering to utilities. The solution combines a new suite of AT&T machine to machine service plans with SmartSynch’s smart grid solutions, already in use at more than 100 utilities in the US. It offers a point-to-point configuration model in which each meter communicates directly with the utility over the AT&T wireless network.

According to the press release, benefits include:

- improved speed of deployment over traditional networks

- the simplicity of an open standard, IP-based network

- the ability to communicate directly with each meter.

Stephen Johnston, chief executive officer, SmartSynch, said: “Together we are providing a cost-effective alternative to private networks, which is shifting the smart-metering landscape for the good of the entire utilities industry.”

That's really the point here. The choice is between using the utility to record smart meter data and companies doing it internally. From the corporate point of view it's primarily a means to track and manage energy use, but for the utility it represents opportunities to add value on meter readings through analysis, offering additional services, changing tariffs, etc. It lets them stay much closer to the client. Utilities will certainly prefer that they get direct access to the data.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

The SPC launches green packaging software

The Sustainable Packaging Coalition (SPC) describes itself as "an industry working group dedicated to creating and implementing sustainable packaging solutions". It was founded in 2003, has over 180 member companies and claims to be the definitive resource for information about packaging sustainability.

Anyway, on Monday the organisation is due to release COMPASS (Comparative Packaging Assessment), a web-based tool that allows packaging designers to assess the environmental impacts of their designs. COMPASS provides the information for a life cycle approach, from manufacture to disposal, to help understand the implications of design decisions. Five-user licenses for COMPASS are $500 annually for SPC members and $750 for non-members.

The data required is being approached by life cycle phase (e.g., manufacture, conversion, transport and end-of-life) and by geographic region (United States, Europe, etc.). U.S. data has been the focus to date but in the future COMPASS will include comparable European data sets and other regions as data is collected.

It sounds like a really useful tool that could (and should) be widely used. It's typically of the way the IT industry can provide the tools to help companies be greener and these tools will become increasingly essential as environmental practices and legislation spread.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Dell is the leading Green IT brand - GreenFactor

Strategic Oxygen conducted a survey for GreenFactor of more than 3,500 enterprise IT decision makers in 11 countries. The study also looked at 26 enterprise technology brands to asses their perceptions of green IT, products and marketing.

According to the study, Dell is the leading green brand among IT buyers mainly due to its recycling programme. Recycling was the top-ranked attribute sought by IT buyers. HP, IBM and Microsoft were noted for their energy efficient products and use of sustainable materials, while Apple held its position in the top five for designing products that are perceived to have a green look and feel (which just goes to show how powerful PR and marketing are).

GreenFactor's first study was in July 2008 and the new research shows some changes in brand rankings, with Dell at 30% moving to number one, replacing HP, which fell to number two at 26%. No single enterprise IT brand is a clear green leader globally (results are available by country surveyed) and there is little statistical difference between the leaders. The full results are available here.

Interestingly, GreenFactor says that the two surveys have identified two distinctive segments that IT buyers use to judge companies. Brand Product attributes include materials used, design and packaging, recycling, energy efficiency and a green image. Brand Operations attributes include having green facilities (manufacturing and/or data canters), using green shipping methods (e.g. non-wasteful packaging, efficient transportation), or leading in developing new green technologies.

To quote the press release 'IT buyers currently rank Brand Products higher than Brand Operations when making purchase decisions, but an IT vendors’ ability to effectively demonstrate environmental stewardship in both areas gives them a distinct advantage'.

This is a point I have been stressing for some time. Whoever you are, whether an IT hardware, software or services supplier, if you want to be successful in green IT then you need to demonstrate how environmentally friendly your own organisation is. But there are still companies that feel it doesn't apply to them (and software companies seem to be the worst).


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

BCS endorses the EU data centre code

The British Computer Society (BCS) is the first professional body and only the second organisation to sign the EU Code of Conduct for Data Centres, which was launched in November last year (we reported on it here).

David Clarke, BCS chief executive officer explains: "This is a vital issue for the IT industry and we're delighted to have been involved in the development of the standard and to be the first professional body to endorse the Code. Our endorsement means that we will work to promote the Code, encourage best practice and help IT professionals gain a better understanding and control of the issue."

The BCS is very active in the area of green IT, with several initiatives, including:

• Creating and launching, later this year, the Practitioner Certificate for Data Centre Operators, a new qualification aimed at supporting the delivery and implementation of the EU Code of Conduct.

• Launching the BCS Foundation Certificate in Green IT in April.

• Launching a simulation tool for data centre operators which will provide information and insight into the choices of energy usage in data centres.

• Developing a series of best practice guides, case studies, white papers and books on the subject of energy efficiency.

I must say it's good to see the BCS getting so actively involved in green IT in such a practical way at grass roots level.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Microsoft Carbon Reduction Targets

A blog by Microsoft's Chief Environmental Strategist has revealed that Steve Ballmer has made an announced to employees that the company has set a goal to reduce its carbon emissions per unit of revenue by at least 30% by 2012, compared with 2007 levels.

The idea is to achieve the goal by improving energy use in buildings and operations, reducing air travel and increasing use of renewable energy. As you would expect, leveraging software and technology is seen as key. Specific aspects mentioned were advances in building operations, expansion of Unified Communications tools to continuing reducing travel and looking for new ways to reduce the use of resources in data center design, build and operation.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Cisco's New Data Centre Offerings

Following on from my comment on Monday, Cisco has now unveiled its new data centre strategy. What it calls the Unified Computing System integrates computing, networking and virtualisation. The concept is an architecture that bridges the silos in the data centre into a unified architecture using industry standard technologies. The architecture combines resources into a single energy-efficient system designed to 'reduce IT infrastructure costs and complexity, help extend capital assets and improve business agility'.

There are several aspects:

* The Cisco Unified Computing System, which promises significant savings in cost of ownership and operational expenditure as well as increased flexibility, scalability and energy efficiency

* New Data Centre designs using Cisco blades, virtualisation, a variety of storage access and integrated management

* Unified Computing Services, in partnership with other suppliers, to help customers benefit from the offering

There's more detail here on the system and services, which will be available to customers in the second quarter of 2009.

The announcement is interesting because it is another step towards the virtualised data centre. I read an article the other day that likened the next generation of integrated data centres to mainframe computers because of their power, reliability and utilisation rate. The difference is that data centres are far more flexible in sharing a variety of resources and that's what makes them so energy efficient. The more efficient the more green.

The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

AT&T Invests in Low-Emissions Vehicles

AT&T has announced plans to invest up to $565m to introduce more than 15,000 alternative-fuel vehicles over the next 10 years. Around $350m will go to buy 8,000 Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) vehicles and $215m to start replacing its passenger cars with alternative-fuel models.

Over the next five years 8,000 gasoline-powered service vehicles will be replaced by CNG models expected to emit approximately 25% less greenhouse gas emissions. Over ten years AT&T expects to replace 7,100 gasoline-powered passenger vehicles with alternative-fuel models, initially hybrids, expected to offer up to a 39% improvement in fuel economy and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by up to 29%. Nearly 800 of the CNG and hybrid electric vehicles will be deployed this year.

It just goes to show how seriously corporations are starting to address their emissions, and the PR value - the company points out that a Green Technology insignia will make the vehicles easy to identify on the road.



The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Intelex Releases GHG Module

Toronto-based Intelex, ‘North America's leading provider of environmental, quality, health & safety and business performance management systems', has released greenhouse gas emissions tracking software for mid-size and enterprise organisations

The software allows users to collect, track, and report their current carbon footprint as well as monitor their progress towards targets. The company claims the software is unique because it has been designed to enable end-users to define multiple emission point sources without the assistance of a technical team. Intelex points out that using the software means companies do not need to acquire costly environmental consulting services. (That was also a point made by Greenstone about their solution when I met them the other week).

Intelex has a range of environmental management software, including Environmental Incidents Management, Hazardous Waste Management, NPDES Reporting Compliance, Spill & Release Reporting, Emergency Response Preparedness, and Environmental Objectives Management among others.

This is going to be a competitive market, but it does seem like the smaller, more innovative players are leading the way at the moment.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Green IT Investment

According to an article in Reuters last week, U.S. companies are increasingly investing in technologies such as virtualisation to cut data centre costs, but are also more closely scrutinising the costs and payback as they try to make the most of shrinking budgets. There has to be a clear ROI in any data centre investment.

The article says that most CIOs are only buying what they absolutely need for the next few months, but some are buying new equipment in the hope that it will help them lower other costs. With 75% of IT spending going to maintenance, it means that companies can invest more on some equipment but still manage to control or cut overall spending.

Not surprisingly there is a lot of vendor focus on the data centre market, since it offers the opportunity of long-term savings for clients - Cisco is apparently due to announce a new data centre strategy this week. The article cites an IBM comment that rationalisation can typically help companies cut energy usage by around 40 to 50%.

Given the amount of talk about data centre efficiency in the last year or two, it's no surprise that it should continue to be a focus in the current economic climate. This is mostly good news from a green perspective, unless machines are simply being swapped out for more energy efficient replacements. Much (sometimes most) of the carbon emissions associated with IT equipment is in the manufacture, so whilst replacements may reduce energy consumption they can add to overall carbon emissions.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Green Lobbying by IT Companies

Following up on my comments last week with regard to Greenpeace's Green IT Challenge, it should be pointed out that there are certainly some organisations of companies (ICT and non-ICT) that are lobbying for stronger green policy and regulation, particularly in the US.

One that received some publicity this week is BICEP (Business for Innovative Climate and Energy Policy) formed around four months ago. Symantec and eBay have just joined Sun Microsystems as members. The organisation says that its goals are to 'work directly with key allies in the business community and with relevant members of Congress to pass meaningful energy and climate change legislation that is consistent with our core principles'.

Other groups with similar aims and ICT members include:

• The Climate Group – a non-profit organisation formed from an international group of companies, governments and supporters aimed at advancing business and government leadership on climate change

• Combat Climate Change (3C) – a global opinion group of companies looking to bring climate change to the forefront of business and trade discussions

• International Climate Change Partnership (ICCP) – a coalition of companies and trade associations committed to contributing to international policy on climate change

• United States Climate Action Partnership (USCAP) - businesses and environmental organisations that are calling on the US federal government to enact national legislation to reduce greenhouse gas emissions

There are also groups more focused on green IT, including the Global e-Sustainability Initiative (GeSI) and the Green Grid.

But the point of my comment last week (and, I think, Greenpeace's concern) is that individual companies will not lobby around specific policies. In this respect the fact that 'BICEP’s members are primarily consumer companies that are not major greenhouse gas emitters, but will nevertheless be impacted by climate regulations and other climate-related impacts' seems significant. Consumer companies can afford to be more overt in their support of green policies - customers are increasingly demanding a greener approach. It's not the same for a business-to-business ICT company working across a range of industry sectors.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

EPA proposes mandatory greenhouse gas reporting

The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has proposed mandatory greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reporting from large sources in the United States.

The idea is that suppliers of fossil fuels or industrial greenhouse gases, manufacturers of vehicles and engines and facilities that emit 25,000 metric tons or more per year of greenhouse gases should submit annual emissions reports to the EPA. This isn't a proposal to control emissions, just that sources above a certain threshold level monitor and report emissions.

EPA has come up with costs for the reporting based on estimates of the number of affected facilities and units in each source category and the associated processes that emit GHGs, with an allowance for measurements that are already being made.

The organisation estimates that 13,200 private sector companies will need to comply and that the total national annualised cost for the first year will be $168m - $134m for subsequent years. Of that, 95% will fall on the private sector and 5% on the public sector to administer the programme. The industries most effected will be oil and natural gas systems (21% of ongoing costs) and iron and steel manufacturing (11%).

Interestingly, the EPA also provides comparable costs for different CO2 emissions threshold levels. If the threshold was 100,000 metric tons then only around half the number of entities would need to report and the first year's cost would be just over $100m. On the other hand, if the threshold was 1,000 metric tons then 59,587 companies would be included at a cost of $426m.


Since no one can ever really get to grips with an effective GHG reduction programme unless they have a good handle on the size of the problem, the number of companies covered by legislation like this can only increase. It seems to me to be inevitable that emissions reports will be part of regular accounts reporting in the not-too-distant future, whether by legislation or just corporate convention. Either way, those software and services companies that make it an easy process will have a ready market.

There's lots of info on the proposal at the EPA web site.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Cisco monitors climate change and builds sustainable cities

Cisco has announced a couple of interesting collaborations in the last week around green IT.

- The company is partnering with NASA to develop an online platform called the 'Planetary Skin' to capture, collect, analyse and report data on the environment collected from satellites, airborne, sea- and land-based sensors around the world. The data will be made available to the public, governments and businesses to measure, report and verify environmental data in near-real-time to help detect and adapt to global climate change. (It sounds like the alternative solutions that NASA referred to when the Orbiting Carbon Observatory failed to live up to its name, which I reported on a couple of weeks ago).

Other participants include the United Nations, multi-lateral development banks, businesses, international government agencies, universities, think tanks, non-governmental agencies and foundations. They will all pool their resources to develop the decision support capabilities to manage natural resources, climate change-related risks, such as a rise in sea level, etc. and new environmental markets, e.g. for carbon. Full details are in this press release.

- Cisco has also announced that it is collaborating with Metropolis, an association of 106 of the world's largest cities, to develop its 'Vision 2030' for sustainable cities. Cisco has signed a Memorandum of Understanding which includes the company advising the association on how to build a collaborative model between member cities and to demonstrate how cities can effectively use technology to advance clean public transportation, decrease pollution through intelligent urban development, offer access to citizen-centric services and support sustainable economic growth. The press release is here.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

More China News

Whilst we're on the subject of China, a couple of other items on the environmental blog caught my eye.

- Firstly, China has its own economic stimulus package (worth around $585bn) aimed at revitalising the country's cooling economy, as caijing.com.cn reported. There are seven areas of investment from infrastructure to education to recovery plans in earthquake-hit Sichuan Province. The breakdown is:


This is a revised plan and 'Sustainable environment' has lost out, falling from 9% to 5% of the total. On the other hand, 'Technology advances' has been increased from 4% to 9% of the total and there are undoubtedly some green tech investments in there.

- The other item of note was a report on a paper about the economic crisis (or crisis in capitalism as it was put) and the impact on China. It was an attempt to show that capitalism is ultimately anti-environment. The blog quoted the following section:

"Capitalism’s ultimate solution to ecological problems - since fundamental changes in the system itself are off limits - is technological. But any technological gains in efficiency in the use of natural resources are overwhelmed by the extensive and ecologically disruptive pattern of growth that characterises this rapacious system. Hence, capitalism is a failed system where ecological sustainability is concerned."

To paraphrase, only technology can overcome our environmental problems, but economic growth in a capitalist system will outstrip technology's ability to save the planet. I've been in some recent discussions along these lines with some senior IT managers and other green IT analysts. It does seem that only strong central government regulation/legislation will save the day, and that is, ultimately, likely to impact economic growth. Discuss.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

China's WEEE

According to a blog on China's environmental laws, China’s State Council announced last week that China’s waste electrical and electronic equipment regulation had been signed.

The overall intention of the law is to encourage recycling and the centralised treatment of electronic waste. It specifies the responsibilities of manufacturers, retailers, repair and customer service providers and recycling companies in the collection and treatment of waste, including TV sets, refrigerators, washing machines, air conditioners and computers, among others.

The blog item reported that as yet the products to be included have not been clearly defined but they will be before the law comes into force. Also, the regulation seems to only cover recycling obligations on producers and importers, whilst sellers just need to supply the drop-off locations.

There's plenty of time for clarification since the laws don't come into effect until 2011, which is a shame, given the tendency for the rest of the world to dump electronic waste in China.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

IBM Leads Corporate Citizens List

CRO (Corporate Responsibility Officer) magazine has published its 10th annual 100 Best Corporate Citizens list.

IBM is third overall and the leading IT company, although not far ahead of HP (5th) and Cisco (6th) with Intel the next IT player, coming in at 13th. The same four companies led the list last year, but in a different order - Intel headed the list for all companies, with Cisco in 14th place, Sun (19th) and IBM (21st). Full details of the list are here.

The list ranks the Russell 1000 Index (a US stock market index of US stocks) in seven areas; environment, climate change, human rights, philanthropy, employee relations, financial and governance. (Last year there was also a 'lobbying' category).

Changes in methodology may account for some differences in 2009 rankings, but apparently the methodology used to compile this year’s list was debated and voted on in open session at the CRO Conference in Chicago last October.

Note that the list is based on publicly available information - another reason for making corporate green activities transparent and public.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

IBM Offers Public Sector Green Consulting

IBM has added to its green IT services with the introduction of the Public Sector Energy and Environment Diagnostic, a consulting service specifically aimed at helping government organisations analyse energy and water use, assess waste management, evaluate overall environmental impact and develop improvement strategies. IBM developed the service to help US federal agencies comply with current requirements to be more efficient and cut costs in environmental, energy and transportation management operations.

The service is based on IBM’s Component Business Model approach. It breaks down organisations into logical segments such as finance, operations, etc. and provides an efficiency and environmental analysis of each segment. Areas for possible environmental improvement are prioritised through colour coding and IBM can help develop a strategy for implementing changes.

IBM now has quite a range of CSR-related consulting offerings, including the CSR Assessment and Benchmarking Utility, the Carbon Tradeoff Modeler, Green Sigma, Environmental Product Lifecycle Management, the Supply Chain Network Optimisation Workbench (or SNOW) and Strategic Carbon Management. The public sector diagnostic is designed to be used together with many of these other offerings.

Once again, IBM shows the way to go. Verticalisation is the way of the industry and the public sector is going to be at the front end of environmental moves as it increasingly sets the pace, particularly in terms of investment during an economic downturn.

My only reservation here is IBM's ability to fully understand the environmental issues and make the most effective recommendations. Of course the company has the capability of providing tools to measure and monitor energy efficiency and environmental impact, but to extrapolate this to recommendations is not necessarily straightforward. I don't know how IBM has developed its tools but I hope there was input from environmental specialists and would prefer to see a partnership in specifying actions. You wouldn't expect Greenpeace to advise you on your IT system.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Greenpeace's Green IT Challenge

Greenpeace has launched an 'IT Climate Leadership Challenge' aimed at getting IT industry CEOs to provide solutions to the threat of global warming and turn it into a business opportunity. The challenge has been addressed at the CEOs of Cisco, Dell, Fujitsu, Google, HP, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, Nokia, Panasonic, Sharp, Sony, Sun Microsystems and Toshiba.

At the end of this year world leaders will meet in Copenhagen to decide on the follow up to the Kyoto Protocol. With that in mind, Greenpeace is challenging the companies' CEOs to:

* Demonstrate their support for a strong Kyoto deal
* Lobby their governments to support strong global mandatory Kyoto regulation
* Significantly cut their own companies' absolute emissions
* Ensure a large scale increase in their companies' own use of renewable energy

To be fair, it's clear that a lot of IT companies are reducing their carbon emissions and many are turning to renewable energy (see the post on Dell on Monday). I guess many would also voice support for a strong agreement in Copenhagen, in general terms.

But the Greenpeace challenge seems to go further. The organisation points out that "there are many powerful industrial groups lobbying against global regulation and the world's climate now needs champions more than ever". But when it gets down to specifics it becomes a problem for IT companies, for two reasons. Firstly, the don't really see it as their role to adopt a stance on an issue outside of the remit of the business. In my experience if the subject comes up in conversations with senior managers (at least those not directly involved in green IT issues) there is often a dismissive laugh and a slight embarrassment about being seen as tree huggers.

More significantly, lobbying is seen as taking sides, which has the potential to deter some potential customers. If you express reservations about excessive air travel you may lose an air industry account. If you promote renewable energy your gas client may go elsewhere.

It is a real concern for IT suppliers, but I think it's a misguided one. Climate change is an issue that will progressively reach into all aspects of society and business. Companies will eventually have to express strong views, if for no other reason than the fact that customers and shareholders will force them to. Those that move early to adopt a moral stand (as companies in other industries are starting to do) will reap the benefits in the longer term.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Green CeBIT

A year ago I commented on how CeBIT was focusing on green IT, but the focus is now even stronger. This year there is a green IT world with over 2000 square metres of exhibits. CeBIT also claims that 53% of all visitors are interested in the subject.

Fujitsu Siemens, Hitachi, IBM, Nokia Siemens, Sun Microsystems and Toshiba are among companies exhibiting in the green IT section of the exhibition and we've already mentioned in previous posts some of the environmentally-friendly product announcements that have been made.

This year the exhibition has also been graced by the presence of the Governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger, who's been there in support of Californian business. He's also picked up an award from the American Chamber of Commerce in Germany for his commitment to environment and energy issues.

In the light of Schwarzenegger's visit it's a little unfortunate to report the findings of research by the Business Performance Management Forum and its Global Renewable Energy and Environmental Network (GREEN) into the efforts (or lack of them) by the entertainment industry to reduce its carbon footprint.

According to the report, 99% of respondents to the survey felt that it is important for digital media & entertainment businesses to reduce their carbon footprint. However, a vast majority of respondents (76%) gave the digital media & entertainment business failing grades (C, D, or F) for their current progress in embracing

California’s film industry is the apparently the state’s second largest polluter, after the oil industry.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Smart Meter Numbers

Smart meters have been getting a lot of coverage recently (there were four posts on the subject in The Green IT Review in February for example) so it's useful to have some measure of the scale.

According to a report from ABI Research the number of smart electricity meters installed worldwide was roughly 49 million in 2007, and is forecast to reach about 76 million this year. That's a 25% compound growth.

The company points out that all utilities are looking to smart metering as a way to be more efficient, better meet demand and respond to environmental requirements and are being encouraged by regulatory bodies, which use both the carrot and stick to promote advances in energy distribution and conservation.

The growth rate in take-up reflects a trend that ABI has seen over recent years; “We don’t think that the economic crisis is having a significant effect. Utilities’ smart metering deployments are typically multi-year plans developed in the context of regulated market environments, and not terribly susceptible to short-term economic fluctuations.” Growth is particularly strong in the US and Europe. Of course the reported $4.5bn of the US stimulus package that will apparently go towards smart metering will help.

The growth in smart meters opens up a variety of opportunities for IT vendors to tie energy information into enterprise solutions, both within the industry itself to manage supply, but also across the economy to monitor and manage energy use and greenhouse gas emissions. There's a lot of green IT innovation coming in the sector.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

The Value of Green IT

There's been some coverage in the last week of comments by Richard Hawkins, Canada Research Chair in Science, Technology and Innovation Policy, who apparently says that there is no evidence that IT necessarily reduces our environmental footprint. The source for the coverage seems to be a press release from the University of Calgary, which is here.

The article isn't very clear, but it seems to convey three points from Hawkins research:

- IT technologies take a lot of energy to make and run and result in a significant amount of, often toxic, waste. This we know and a lot of time, effort and expense is being directed at reducing these impacts (for example, see my posting earlier this week about zero-watt PCs from Fujitsu-Siemens Computers). Hawkins acknowledges the efforts.

- However, his second point is that IT has an indirect impact that will not be mitigated by greener products. The use of technology supports other activities that do have environmental implications, such as mobile phones and laptops which allow us to be more mobile, which in turn creates more greenhouse gas emissions.

This is of course true, but leads to a minefield of implications. What we do know is that the use of technology is directly correlated with economic development and growth. Ultimately we may need to take action in this respect, but until the world is at least on a level playing field international politics is going to prevent any restriction on technology use.

- The article goes on "Hawkins says the problem is not that IT is inherently more or less green than other technologies. The problem is that it has been applied so extensively that its environmental implications—positive as well as negative—are often overlooked. Hawkins and his research team are establishing a more reliable basis for identifying and assessing the contribution of IT to our environmental footprint".

Well, based on this article, Hawkins seems to be focusing on the negative aspects and much work has already been done on the positive contribution that IT can make in a variety of areas. In particular I would point to the Smart 2020 report produced by The Climate Group (with the help of McKinsey) for the Global e-Sustainability Initiative (GeSI) looking at the potential impact of IT. The main thrust of the report, which was published last June and I commented on at the time, is to point out that ICT emissions are set to grow at an average annual rate of 5.7% from 2002 to 2020. However, the five opportunities identified in the report (dematerialisation, smart buildings, smart power, smart industry and smart transport) could lead to emissions reductions of five times that of the ICT sector.

I hope Hawkins gives a balanced view when he contributes his research to the Earth Summit in Copenhagen at the end of the year.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Green Apple?

You would think that with such a logo and its worldwide reputation Apple would be one of the greenest IT companies around. Well it's hard to say.

I have made the point several times that companies need to be transparent about what they're doing to make their organisations more environmentally friendly. A major, and probably the most significant forum for doing this is the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP).

CDP describes its mission as:"To collect and distribute high quality information that motivates investors, corporations and governments to take action to prevent dangerous climate change". It does this through gathering information from leading companies around the world and publishing it - in 2008 more than 3,700 companies responded. The CDP claims (and most would agree) that it "plays a vital role in encouraging private and public sector organisations to measure, manage and reduce emissions and climate change impacts".

Anyway, Apple did respond last year, although it's previous record was patchy, at best. However, the CDP has now developed something called the Carbon Disclosure Leadership Index (CDLI) which provides "...a valuable perspective on the range and quality of responses to CDP’s questionnaire". Companies are scored out of 100.

A quick browse of the web site reveals that the score for IBM was 92, Dell 91, HP 88, Microsoft 71, SAP 65, Oracle 61 and Google 58. Apples score was just 7 (seven). The CDP response provided by the company, such as it is, can be seen here.

I guess Apple's actual efforts to be greener are better than the CDP data suggests, but that's the point. If you don't publish information in an open, independent forum using accepted methodologies, then who knows?

The odd thing is that Al Gore is on Apple's Board, and has been for almost five years.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Green ICT Update

Here's a few short items of interest from the last week:

- PRC Technologies, a division of Print Recovery Concepts, Inc., is offering laser printer cartridges using toner powder derived from soybeans. The SoyPrint™ brand will apparently be at comparable prices to current brand named, oil-based toner cartridges. It seems that soy ink has been available for some time, but this is the first time a soy-based option has been available in laser cartridges. The cartridges are made in the US and it looks like they're only available in the US at the moment.

- O2 has become the first UK mobile operator to be officially certified with the Carbon Trust Standard. The award recognises O2’s commitment to a 15% reduction in energy consumption achieved over the past three years. The press release cites a number of initiatives the company has adopted including a £1.4m investment in smart metering technology to monitor energy consumption at cell sites and other premises, more energy efficiency technology in the O2 network, removal of air conditioning on certain cell sites, reducing PC monitor standby time and waterless urinals in offices and contact centres (?). Overall, the company has saved 47,000 tonnes of CO2 through a variety of measures.

- Here's a good idea. According to treehugger, some time ago small towns in Germany started turning off street lights to save money, but residents, understandably, don't like it. A solution emerged in a place called Morgenröthe-Rautenkranz, where the 900 citizens have been given the option of turning on the lights by mobile telephone. The town now saves 4000 euros a year. There seem to be a several such schemes in Germany now; in some cases residents call the lights directly, which then come on for 15 minutes (but you have to know the number to call) and elsewhere the caller is charged for the cost of the light. However it works, it's a good idea for saving energy and money.



The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Dell Increases Wind Usage

Dell is now powering its 240,000 square-foot Oklahoma City campus with 100% wind energy and expects to avoid nearly 5,100 tons of CO2 emissions a year as a result. It means that Dell now sources about 35% of its U.S. energy from green power and approximately 20% of its globally power. The company has also announced a plan to reduce its worldwide facilities’ greenhouse gas emissions by 40% by 2015 through energy efficiency, on-site renewable-energy and partnerships with utility providers.

You could be forgiven for wondering what's going on here, given that last August the company announced that it was carbon neutral, as we reported at the time. The point is that Dell reached this goal, as this latest press release points out, 'through a combination of operational efficiencies, greater investment in green power and responsible offsets to cover remaining impacts'.

Firstly it's interesting to note that Dell refers to 'responsible' offsets, since this can often be a dubious area and comes into some criticism.

More significantly, the use of offsets rather dilutes these further claims. If the company was already carbon neutral, then further emissions reductions have no positive carbon impact, unless the offsets are being commensurately decreased. I assume they are, but it wasn't in the press release.

I certainly don't want to criticise Dell in this respect, the company seems to be working hard on reducing its emissions (and that of its products). But it's better to be very clear about how 'carbon neutrality' has been achieved and if further CO2 reductions are announced then transparency dictates that we should know what impact that has on the offsets.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

SAP Sustainable Business Focus

SAP this morning announced a long-term strategic focus on sustainability, covering both its own operations and also the solutions it offers to customers. The announcement coincides with SAP co-CEO Léo Apotheker giving a keynote speech at CeBIT this week addressing sustainability and related issues in the context of information technology.

The announcements from SAP cover three areas:

- Together with TechniData AG, SAP has unveiled expanded solutions for environment, health and safety (EHS) management. SAP will own and sell a full line of co-created EHS applications to be offered under a single name, SAP® Environment, Health, and Safety Management (SAP EHS Management).

As well as delivering sustainable business processes, the company is also helping its customers practice green IT by enabling them to reduce the energy footprint of SAP solutions in their data centres through consolidation, virtualisation and other optimisation services.

- To demonstrate its own commitment to sustainable operations the company announced its target of a 51% reduction in total greenhouse gas emissions from its 2007 baseline levels by 2020. This will put SAP back to its approximate year-2000 emissions level of 250,000t CO2. SAP initiated its first global GHG inventory in 2008 and will report performance and progress towards the target in its annual sustainability report.

The target will apply not only to SAP’s direct emissions, but also to indirect emissions such as business travel, which was 42% of SAP’s total footprint in 2007.

- The company has formed a new cross-functional sustainability organisation to lead its efforts. The new Chief Sustainability Officer and Executive Vice President of Sustainability Solutions will lead a global team that overseas all sustainability initiatives (internal and customer solutions) and will report directly to a SAP Executive Board member.


The press release says that 'SAP understands that its long-term success is directly related to both appropriately addressing sustainability internally and to enabling its customers to meet the same challenges'. It's good to see that the company has reached this conclusion, but it has taken some time to get there. I met with SAP in May of last year to talk about their efforts around green IT and was not very impressed by their rather laid-back approach to providing customer solutions, which was that they would provide what the market needed when the demand was there.

As far as it's internal efforts to be more green are concerned, the company produced its first sustainability report only last year. It has been responding to the CDP annual request for information since 2004, but only on the basis that the responses are not published, which rather defeats the object.

Lets not carp, though. Perhaps the most significant part of the press release is a quote from Léo Apotheker; "As the leader in business software, we also deliver solutions that help other businesses achieve clarity across their operations and better manage their sustainability performance. This is why we are making a strategic, long-term commitment to operate our company in a sustainable way and to help businesses address social, environmental and governance challenges on a global scale.”

SAP certainly can, and should, be a significant player in proving enterprises with the means to measure and manage their carbon footprint and environmental impact.

By the way, if you're a SAP watcher I would recommend taking a look at the SAP-related blog Feeding the SAP Ecosystem from PAC. It's a market that my friends at PAC know better than most.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.

Fujitsu Siemens and the Zero Watt PC

Not completely zero watt of course (that would be a story!), but Fujitsu Siemens Computers (FSC) has announced what it claims to be the world's first PC not to consume any power when in off-mode or hibernating.

The real benefit of this product is that it remains 'administrable' during a pre-set time slot for updates and other tasks. The PC can automatically go into the zero watt state, but the administrator can define a time when it wakes up and waits for updates, then it goes back to (zero watt) sleep. It's turned on again by the 'on' switch.

These PCs also have other green features, including an Energy Star 5.0 compliant power supply, Halogen-free mainboards, switched monitor outlet and a power-saving Intel chipset and processor.

There is a cost issue here, though. FSC's points out that these additional capabilities, particularly the power supply, are more expensive to manufacture, which suggest a higher price. On the other hand, based on some usage assumptions by FSC the estimate is that a zero watt mode would save somewhere between €1.7 and €3.46 a PC a year in energy costs. Whilst prices are not known, it suggests that a purchase decision would need to be based on more than just the energy saved.

The zero watt function will be available in the summer on the company's ESPRIMO E7935 and ESPRIMO P7935 0-Watt models (but you can see it at CeBIT, which starts on Tuesday). A step-by-step introduction into other product models is planned.


The Green IT Report offers a range of market research and consultancy services on the impact and opportunities that environmental issues represent for the ICT sector. Click here for more details.