SAP’s new green office

SAP has built a new c$90m 200,000-square-foot office in Philadelphia which is expected to achieve the U.S. Green Building Council's Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Platinum standard in 2010. According to the press release earlier this year and a recent article in the Philadelphia Inquirer, the building will include:

• a floor-to-ceiling glass exterior and an open-space plan that takes maximum advantage of daylight. Lighting systems dim the lighting levels and raise or lower window shades based on the level of sunlight coming through the triple-glazed glass exterior wall

• a one-acre roof garden

• an air-conditioning system that makes its own ice for cooling. Overnight, when energy demands and electric rates are low, the system makes ice, and the chilled water from the melting ice is used to cool the building during the day.

• toilets that use rainwater for flushing

• low-flow bathroom fixtures that use less water, with an expected saving of more than one million gallons of water per year

• ten 400-feet deep thermal wells in the back lawn use the constant ground temperature to both heat and cool areas of the building

• Cubicles and flooring made from recycled parts

• doors made of bamboo

• the use of native and regional vegetation species in landscaping and the maintenance of extensive open space

The energy-efficient features are expected to cut the building's energy use by almost a half, compared with conventional buildings, with the additional cost of implementing the features recovered in seven to 10 years.

Impressive stuff.

Canada’s green ICT investment

Canada’s non-profit Advanced Research and Innovation Network, CANARIE, is funding four green ICT research projects to the tune of $2.4m.

Most of the money ($2m) is going to the Greenstar Network, an alliance of IT companies, universities and others led by Quebec’s École de technologie supérieure (ÉTS) in Montreal.  The money will be used to develop the world’s first internet network with nodes powered entirely by wind and solar energy.  Dr. Mohamed Cheriet, Director of Synchromedia at ÉTS and spokesperson for the GreenStar Network, said “The GreenStar Network has come together to develop low-carbon technologies, including renewable energy like wind and solar-powered networks, virtualization, carbon quantification procedures and tools to ensure ICT’s carbon footprint remains under control and doesn’t increase as the world becomes more and more reliant on information and communications technologies.”

Other projects given funding are:

• to design an ultra-efficient data centre for high-performance computing applications

• a study to assess the business case, and carbon-offset potential, for Canadian universities to use CANARIE’s ultra high-speed network to run IT operations from remote, zero-carbon data centre facilities

• developing a business case for how carbon offsets can be used to finance data centre relocations and how universities could implement this opportunity.

Smart grid/renewable energy news

• The US Department of Energy has announced $620m funding for 32 projects to demonstrate Smart Grid technologies. Projects include large-scale energy storage, smart meters, distribution and transmission system monitoring devices. The funding is from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act and will bring in a further $1bn from the private sector.

• The Energy Technologies Institute (ETI), a UK-based company formed from industry and Government to address the need for clean energy, has announced two projects to identify the problems associated with distributing renewable energy.

The Offshore Connection project will examine the issue of connection offshore energy to the grid, whilst the Network Capacity project will assess new technology solutions to enhance transmission and distribution capacity. They’re both due to be completed in seven months.

• Craig Conway, former PeopleSoft CEO, has joined the board of eMeter, a company that provides the software to enable smart grid deployment. eMeter, which is backed by a group of venture capitalists (although Siemens also has a stake), claims to have 24 million meters under contract. It also has strategic partnerships with Accenture, IBM, Logica, and Siemens, which is a pretty powerful collection.

It shows how mainstream smart meter technology is becoming when someone previously with a world class software company gets involved.

Green mobile manifesto

The GSMA, in collaboration with The Climate Group, has released a report called “Mobile’s Green Manifesto”, which aims to set out how the mobile industry can contribute to the fight against global warming.  It also makes some policy recommendations, for governments in general and the Copenhagen climate change discussions in particular, to help fulfil mobile’s potential as an enabler in reducing emissions.

The industry has already laid out goals, the main one being a reduction in total global greenhouse gas emissions per connection by 40% by 2020 (compared to 2009).  The plan is that in the next 12-24 months, the industry will also agree a mechanism for measuring emissions, with a view to making a commitment to becoming carbon neutral.  Mobile connections are expected to increase by 70% by 2020, but the industry expects total emissions to remain constant.  Apparently the total emissions are equivalent to the whole of the Netherlands.

At the user end, the operators will work with handset vendors to reduce handset energy use by 40% by 2020.  And operators will also work towards a 40% drop in life-cycle emissions of network equipment components by 2020.

In terms of enablement, mobile technologies are already being used to deliver smart solutions in a variety of sectors, including enabling individuals to monitor their own carbon footprint, for example through smart meters and associated devices. 

The GSMA believes that the industry could enable greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to twice the emissions of the United Kingdom in 2020. These emission reductions would originate in sectors such as power, buildings, transportation and logistics, and dematerialisation.

Among the policy issues that the GSMA wants considered are:

• Including mobile solutions in policies around smart grids, buildings and transport.

• Aligning national and regional methodologies to measure the mobile sector’s environmental performance with those being developed by ETSI and ITU.

• Supporting broadband infrastructure deployment, particularly of energy efficient networks (I think planning permission is the issue here).

• Encouraging collaboration between the mobile and other ICT sectors and the transport, buildings and power sectors, particularly around interoperability standards.

• Greening operations in the public service, e.g. through embedded, mobile-enabled smart building technologies in public buildings.

• Building awareness of mobile technologies that could help reduce carbon emissions.

• Incentivising the increased deployment of embedded mobile solutions in smart grids, buildings and transport.

This is a very useful report – you can read it here.  Clearly the mobile sector has a significant part to play in delivering all sorts of smart technology, although it will also be competing with a range of other communications technologies, not least the ubiquitous growth of broadband.

For me, though, what lets the ‘manifesto’ down is that whilst the industry calls on policy makers to help them in their enablement role (which will inevitable mean lots more business), only now is the industry collectively addressing its own emissions.  Targets start from this year, so achievements are yet to be seen.  My guess is that the industry would get a lot more support from policy makers if it had started its collective actions a year or two ago.

Green practices stay at home

An interesting survey from Tickbox.net/Opinion concludes that whilst the British follow good environmental practices at home, they don’t always take their concerns or actions to work with them.

The report found that in the UK:

• 21% print out emails when they don’t need to

• 13% leave work without switching their computer off

• 33% turn off electrical goods at the end of the day at home, but not at work

• 18% don’t know what their organisation’s green policy is.

The survey was released as part of a Defra (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) campaign to urge small businesses to cut down on waste and reduce energy and water use in order to reap the financial benefits. Defra estimates that UK businesses could save £6.4bn a year by implementing the sort of resource efficiency measures that employees do at home, such as turning down thermostats, turning off lights and addressing dripping taps.

Whilst environmental evangelists may have been a factor in bringing green issues into the workplace, it seems that among the wider population the main concern is their own homes.

It’s not an unexpected finding that simply implementing rules at work is not enough.  Green ICT is a good example, since much good practice depends on the end users taking action in turning machines to standby or off, printing less, making do with fewer electronic gadgets, etc.  Green ICT, and indeed any business environmental policy needs good communication and employee buy-in.  It involves explaining not just how you achieve green ICT, but why it’s necessary and how everyone gains in the long term.

Managing unavoidable climate change

A new report from three institutional investment companies - Henderson Global Investors, Insight Investment, and the Universities Superannuation Scheme – maintains that companies and their investors are not properly accounting for the impact of climate change on their investment decisions.

The report, which also had input from Acclimatise, a specialist risk management consultancy, is entitled ‘Managing the Unavoidable: investment implications of a changing climate” and is published alongside four sector specific reports covering oil and gas, UK commercial property, UK energy generation and the UK water sector. The reports can be downloaded from here.

The report points out that concern is primarily directed towards extreme weather, such as storms or floods, rather than on incremental changes, such as temperature, which can impact facilities management and energy efficiency. Seb Beloe, Head of SRI Research at Henderson Global Investors, commented; “The research underpinning this report suggests that we as investors need to pay much greater attention to how climate change/weather affects our investment decisions. This will require paying attention to how climate change adaptation will affect company-specific business models, value drivers, strategy, governance, cash flows and assets”.

Among the Key findings of the report:

• Companies are putting more effort into how to address specific one-off climate events than in adapting for long-term change.

• Risk assessment processes are weak, particularly in respect of incremental changes and indirect impacts.

• Companies are more concerned about risks than opportunities. The emphasis is on the fact that those who are prepared have a potential business opportunity over those who are not.

• Public policy inconsistencies are an obstacle. Examples cited are the differences in time horizons in looking ahead and also on-going issues around UK planning regulations.

The report makes several recommendations for investors, primarily around building climate change into decisions and ensuring companies are giving it due weight. It also advocates investors getting more involved in public policy debates around adaptation.

The report is based on an examination of specific industry sectors but is applicable across most of the commercial world. To some extent it reflects research from The Green IT Report a year or so ago which reached similar conclusions. Not so much about adaptation, but that the impact of climate change will not just be through one-off, large-scale, dramatic events directly hitting business facilities. There are potentially a variety of impacts and knock-on effects from climate change events far and wide. Examples included power shortages and blackouts, telecoms failures, medical epidemics leading to resource shortages, inability to get to work or travel on business, and the impact these would have on suppliers, distributors and resellers. It may not just be from one event, but from a combination of events up and down the supply chain.

Whichever way you look at it, businesses are currently ill-prepared for climate change, probably waiting until it’s too late before taking truly effective action. But clearly there are opportunities for ICT companies to help by creating more resilient supply chain systems, flexible transport/logistics solutions, etc and also providing the monitoring systems to allow companies to adapt when things start going wrong. It’s an area of green IT that will become increasingly important.

News Corp chooses Hara

Media conglomerate News Corp. has chosen to deploy the Hara Environmental and Energy Management (Hara EEM) solution to help manage its carbon emissions. The software will provide the central corporate platform for measuring, managing and monitoring the company’s energy and environmental data.

EEM is an enterprise software-as-a-service (SaaS) solution to help monitor and manage environmental impact in energy, water and waste.

As the press release points out; “Hara EEM provides News Corporation with the on-demand capabilities required to confidently manage environmental information, report against multiple global protocols, find cost savings opportunities, track progress and share best practices across worldwide operations”.

Managing carbon emissions is becoming a major task for a global corporation such as News Corp. With multiple stakeholders to address, spreading legislation and even wider reporting requirements its a task that has the potential to escalate out of control without the right solution in place. It’s not just the counting, it’s also the ability to build carbon costs into corporate plans and test alternative scenarios.

This is a spectacular win for Hara, but there are many players out there now fighting for a foothold in the carbon emissions management software (CEMS) market, so it’s going to get very competitive and the number of suppliers will continue to grow.

If you want to know more about CEMS take a look at a new web site provided by Connection Research. It’s a census of all the products on the market and can be found at www.cemsus.com. There is also a (free) detailed report on the market which I can highly recommend – I wrote quite a lot of it! It’s available via the Cemsus portal or on the Connection Research web site.

TalkingPlugs

Canada-based Zerofootprint has announced TalkingPlug, a device that tracks and reports on appliance energy use and carbon emissions.  The device plugs into an electrical socket and enables two-way communication with the Internet. It identifies how much electricity individual appliances are using and also allows appliances to be turned off remotely. 

The TalkingPlug doesn’t require the presence of any other smart technology.  All it needs is for the device to be plugged into a standard outlet (in North America), information about the device to be monitored needs to be provided and that’s it.  The plug contains energy measurement instruments, on-off relays, appliance identification tags, and wireless networking technology to send appliance-specific energy consumption data to a local gateway for collection and storage.  The companies online interface displays the data graphically, with trends and comparison measures.

Zerofootprint is working with utility companies and appliance manufacturers to launch the product globally.  But the name might put potential users off.

Green supercomputer rankings

The latest Green500 list is out and reveals that IBM is the source for 90% of the top 20 most energy-efficient supercomputers. The list is published by Green500.org at the same time as Top500.org announces its ranking of the TOP500 supercomputers worldwide.

IBM’s dominance at the top is no great surprise, given its strength in the market. It held the same proportion of the top 20 green supercomputers the last time rankings were released, which we reported on back in July. The assessment is based on FLOPS-per-Watt, and the top ranking machine achieved 723 MFlops/Watt.

However, for the Green500 as a whole, HP has more machines in the list than IBM (209 vs 185). But whilst the average ranking for the IBM machines is 151, the HP machines, which average only a third of the computer power of the IBM supercomputers in the top 500, languish at an average ranking of 366. It’s because the larger the machines the more efficient they tend to be (and the trend is towards ever larger machines).

The fastest supercomputer out there is the Cray XT5-HE Opteron Six Core 2.6 GHz (Jaguar XT5 for short) at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in the US. It’s only 44th in the Green supercomputer ranking, but as we surmised in our last report on these lists, its actually being used to create models to predict climate change! Ironic, but it makes the point that we need to manage the emissions from computers, because we clearly can’t do without them.

New sustainable asset consulting service from IBM

IBM has introduced a consulting service, called Sustainable Asset Analytics, to help clients manage facilities, supplier performance, carbon data collection, asset lifecycle maintenance and supporting activities.

The service addresses the waste and emissions from poor planning and maintenance, inadequate energy management, the heating or cooling of unused space and the inability to collect and analyze operational information. “Buildings alone are a source of huge waste and inefficiency, accounting for 70% of all energy use and 38% of all carbon dioxide emissions in the US,” according to Rich Lechner, energy and environment vice president for IBM. “Squeezing out that inefficiency and cost requires new ‘smarter’ technologies and business analytics.”

The company cites the case of Natural England, an independent public body that advises the UK government on the environment.  The organisation has apparently already reduced CO2 emissions by 25%, with a target of 50% by next year, as the result of implementing, with the help of IBM, a detailed carbon reduction strategy and plan for travel, property, information technology and procurement. 

Basically, this is pulling together IBM’s existing capabilities including the Maximo Property Performance Management Solution software, the Green Sigma consulting offering, Strategic Carbon Management, and the BI/analytics tools from Cognos.  So there’s nothing really new here, but IBM is a past master at repackaging services and solutions and marketing them very effectively.  You can only really do that if you have the portfolio to call on in the first place, and IBM certainly has that.

If you want to know more, there’s a podcast at www-03.ibm.com/press/feed/audio/SSA_Podcast_Simon_Parsons_FINAL.mp3. 

New public sector GHG standard

The Greenhouse Gas Protocol Initiative – the organisation that has set the standard for carbon emissions accounting methodology – is developing new accounting guidance for government operations. 

The GHG Protocol Public Sector Standard (US) is aimed at helping all types of government bodies to meet various reporting objectives.  The first objective is the US, but with the GHG Protocol already the basis for most carbon accounting worldwide, versions, or at least a template, for use elsewhere can’t be far behind.

The new guidance will address the organisational and structural challenges that governments face in accounting for carbon, something that is becoming increasingly clear in various parts of the world (and the UK is no exception).  It will emphasise the “operational control” approach, i.e. only accounting for emissions over which an organisation has control and how to account for leased buildings and vehicle fleets.  I guess issues of outsourcing will also be included, which is certainly an issue for the public sector in the UK.

The GHG Protocol is working with Logistics Management Institute (LMI), the EPA and the US Department of Energy (DOE) on the project.  A draft has already been produced and comments invited, with a final draft due in January 2010.

Logica’s ‘game-changing’ green solution

The Economist has included Logica’s EMO emissions monitoring system in its list of ten innovative solutions to combat climate change.  Logica is due to present the solution at The Economist’s Carbon Economy Summit in Washington, which ends today.

EMO is a system that monitors vehicle emissions in real time.  It uses a plug-in device connected to the vehicles computer to transmit emissions data to a central office.  The idea is that data from EMO can be used to offer differential fuel pricing to the vehicle driver - if driving behaviour is green, petrol stations can offer fuel at a lower price. 

GBS Bindra, Global Innovation Director, Logica, said, “EMO is truly a solution that can help every individual to make a positive impact on climate change. We are working with governments, regulatory bodies and oil retail companies in a collaborative frame work to create an ecosystem where EMO, coupled with progressive policy-making, drives the overall societal good.”

It’s important for ICT suppliers to keep pushing these big ideas.  Innovation is going to be more important in addressing climate change than anything else, so companies need to show their thought leadership.  Apart from showing commitment, it also means you’re best placed for the significant rewards when one of these economy-wide projects is adopted.  Which they surely will – maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon …

Helix Wind to power cell towers.

I like wind turbines of all descriptions, but there are some particularly novel designs of turbines (and solar cell arrays) starting to appear for mobile cell towers.

The latest example is from Helix Wind Corp. which has announced the start of a technology demonstration and test of two small wind turbines to power cell phone towers in Southern California.

The test will also explore the feasibility of selling power back to the electrical grid, which should raise the interest of network providers.

With 3,500 cell phone towers in Southern California alone (and another 1,000+ expected in the next five years), this is potentially very big business for renewable energy suppliers.

The test is being carried out in association with Core Communications Group on behalf of its tower company client, Vertical Green.

BCS collaborates with The Green Grid

BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT, and The Green Grid, have agreed to work together in the areas of data centre energy efficiency, research, and best practice.

As readers will know, The Green Grid is a global consortium addressing energy efficiency in data centres through recommendations on best practices, metrics, e.g. the well-known PUE/DCIE, and technologies.  BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT, is, confusingly, one organisation.  Originally known as the British Computer Society – shortened to BCS – it now seems to have adopted a second name as well.  It’s the professional membership body for IT in the UK, although it seems to be looking for a wider voice.

Anyway, the idea is that the two will work together on a framework to improve the effectiveness of research into tools, metrics and best practice.  The two organisations have agreed to:

Help shape the energy efficient technologies and strategies of the future

Jointly establish relevant programmes to promote energy efficiency

Give mutually reinforcing, clear and coherent messages to the industry, where appropriate

Make a joint external announcement of the values and aims of the collaboration

The BCS is already active in Green IT.  It has endorsed the EU Data Centre Code of Conduct and in January it announced that it was developing a qualification for data centre operators based on the Code, which is apparently now being piloted.

My concern is that BCS, The Chartered Institute of IT, seems to now be treading on the toes of Intellect, the UK IT industry trade body, which has had an active Data Centres group for some time (I went along to one of their discussions on the CRC and its impact).  What we don’t want is a proliferation of organisations with different approaches to addressing the issues.

How about Intellect and the BCS getting together around Green IT?  After all, Green IT is one area that really needs both company policy and the support of the individuals at the coal face to be truly effective.

Capgemini UK wins green government contract

The Environment Agency in the UK has signed a seven-year outsourcing contract with Capgemini which includes the aim of cutting the Agency’s IT carbon emissions by half in the next few years. (The Environment Agency is a government agency that reports to the department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs - Defra).

The contract includes a comprehensive set of green measures, from the production and transportation of hardware to energy savings for each end-user, and includes the reduction, reuse and recycling of hardware, with disposals under WEEE regulations.

The services included cover all IT infrastructure and application management outsourcing, with applications including things like flood warning and waste management.

Interestingly, the contract has been designed so that it can be reused by other Government and public sector organisations, so it is setting a standard for the public sector as a whole. The Agency also believes that with environmental measures built in from the outset, the total cost of IT purchase and operation should
be reduced.

Christine Hodgson, Vice President and member of the Capgemini Group Executive Committee, said: “We are proud to have won this important contract on the strength of the value of our proposition to the Environment Agency and our commitment to sustainable IT. We believe this contract should become a benchmark that will shape and influence how other organisations in the public and private sectors adopt sustainable IT as a business benefit, and that where the Environment Agency has led, others will inevitably follow.”

A great win for Capgemini in the UK, particularly since it seems to be establishing a green contract benchmark for government and maybe even in the private sector. The UK operation is certainly leading the green IT charge for Capgemini, although there does seem to be a lack of coordinated effort internationally.

Viridity launches application-based data centre energy assessment

Massachusetts-based Viridity Software has been officially launched as a company and has also unveiled its solution, which is aimed at providing a more holistic approach to greener data centres.

It’s an application-driven method to trace energy consumption through the physical infrastructure, IT equipment and applications layers.  It analyses the findings and generates an actionable report, including visual modelling of what’s going on.  There’s a graphic view of data centre assets mapped to power and cooling data for each component and tied to business applications as well as step-by-step "what to do next" recommendations.

 

 

Viridity argues that data centres have suffered from a lack of clear management - IT management, facilities management and others have all been involved, each with their own agenda.  No one has a good overall understanding of the resources and capabilities, with the danger that the data centre stagnates, through fear of reaching capacity, or, alternatively, investment is made in equipment or applications that cannot be accommodated.  Operational energy costs are now the biggest expenditure in data centres.

Viridity’s aim is to provide the cross-functional solution for understanding the connection between the physical layers and the applications.  As Mike Rowan, Founder and CTO put it; “Today, most organisations focus on just the physical infrastructure – or, how the power is delivered to the data centre, as opposed to why it is being consumed.  Viridity recognises that there needs to be a clear connection between the business and the power consumption.  The breadth and depth of this correlation is critical, as this is where virtually all of the data centre’s power demand is derived from.  In fact, over 70% of the average data centre’s opportunity for optimisation lies in the IT and application layer – while all other power consumption in the data centre (such as cooling) is simply reactive to what happens here. Once organisations fully understand these connections, they can establish actionable strategies to run more efficient, highly-optimised, eco-friendly data centres.”

It sounds an interesting solution and it is certainly a move to the next level of data centre energy management.  This is clearly a path that is going to get more sophisticated over time as each level of efficiency is lost to the unstoppable growth in demand.  It started with turning lights off and has moved on to letting machines run hotter, using natural cooling and similar obvious wins.  At the same time, IT infrastructure is being consolidated and virtualised to increase server efficiency and minimise cooling needs.  But ultimately it’s the applications that are driving demand.  They have their own inefficiencies but also represent the ultimate priority – that’s what Viridity is addressing.

The company may be breaking new ground, but it’s a natural progression and this start-up won’t be on its own for long (if it is now).

Carlson Wagonlit Travel offers Telepresence

In what is a really interesting development, global travel company Carlson Wagonlit Travel (CWT) is to partner with Tata Communications to provide Telepresence facilities.  TelePresence is the Cisco high-definition videconferencing capability that tries to emulate a face-to-face meeting.

CWT clients will be able to access Tata Communications’ global network of public Cisco TelePresence suites.  They will also have access to Tata’s Global Meeting Exchange (GMX), which supports sessions between any Cisco TelePresence rooms (public or private), irrespective of the network service provider.

The CWT’s Telepresence service will help customers in determining if and when a virtual meeting meets their business needs and will manage the process from reservation through to reporting on adoption of the service and related cost savings.  It’s part of a wide range of travel-related services the company is now offering, ranging from organising meetings and events, implementing best practice, advising on travel policy, etc.

"CWT recognizes the intense pressure corporations are under to contain rising Travel and Entertainment costs and maximize return on investment," said Pauline Quéré, CWT vice president, Customer Product Marketing. "By incorporating Telepresence into the full range of products and services in our demand management offering, CWT provides a compelling alternative and solidifies its role as a key partner in helping clients demonstrate measurable return on investment."

The difference is that services to date have been travel–related, whilst this is an alternative to travel.  It sends out a very clear message when a travel company feels that providing a service that is an alternative to its core business is a worthy investment.  There must be a lot of companies reducing or avoiding travel and they’re not all going to go back to the old ways. 

NSN launches Energy Solutions

Nokia Siemens Networks  (NSN), the mobile network infrastructure business, has launched a range of energy efficient solutions aimed at reducing the power consumption of telecoms networks.  The company claims it’s the first complete offering for operators of new and legacy telecommunications networks.

NSN’s Energy Solutions consists of six elements aimed at different market requirements; Energy Modernisation, Off-Grid Site Solution, Bad-Grid Site Solution, Energy Efficiency Consulting, Green Energy Control and Energy OPEX Management

The company cites several benefits from the services and it’s no real surprise, given the current economic climate, that green ICT is not top of the list:

1) Increased energy efficiency means lower operating costs.  The company points out that the proportion of operator OPEX that goes on energy ranges from 10% in developed markets to 30% in developing markets.  In all, 86% of a mobile operator’s energy consumption occurs in the network infrastructure.

2) Networks are expanding into areas where there’s no electricity supply or the supply is not good enough.

3) Last in the list of benefits is climate change, with communications service providers needing to reduce CO2 emissions.

As energy acquires a cost, points 1 and 3 are likely to merge into one, but currently the fast payback in reduced total cost of ownership seems to be the driving force behind these new services.

Australian e-waste scheme planned

Australia’s Environment Ministers have agreed to create a national legislative framework to address e-waste. The decision was announced in an Environmental Protection Heritage Council (EPHC) meeting in Perth yesterday.

The legislation will cover the disposal of electronic products including computers, printers monitors and televisions and comes after years of pressure from consumer and Green groups. In 2007-2008 only one in 10 televisions and computers in Australia was recycled and e-waste is estimated to be increasing by 17% a year. The national scheme is expected to see 70-80% of all televisions and computers recycled by 2020.

Under the scheme, which will be implemented next year, manufacturers and importers of electronic equipment will be obliged to join a government-accredited Producer Responsibility Organisation (PRO).  Multiple PROs are likely to be set up, potentially a TV industry PRO, an AIIA (Australian Information Industry Association) PRO and also individual PROs set up by suppliers who preferred to use their own schemes.  The AIIA has already outlined its plans for a PRO, covering the financing model, scope, timeline and target for a viable take-back program.

Under the scheme consumers will drop off electronic waste at collection centres with manufacturers bearing the cost.  Most suppliers are expected to absorb the cost, rather than pass it on.

Final details have been thrashed out since May, but the scheme closely follows the Byteback initiative, which has been running in Victoria as a pilot.  Byteback will apparently continue to run over the next year in Victoria whilst legislation is formalised and then will then become the national scheme.

Green views get legal support

In researching and writing about Green IT I’ve always stressed the fact that there are a number of reasons why companies choose to address climate change, all of which will become increasingly important.  So it won’t just be energy-hungry companies that will seek help from IT, nearly all organisations will need to take action.

In the current economic climate, the fact that reducing energy use invariably saves money has been a driving force.  Legislation is also coming much more into focus, particularly in the UK.  But the the views of shareholders are as important, a fact that the CDP can attest to, and customers have no less influence, since they can vote with their feet.

Perhaps at the bottom of the list, but still important, are employees.  Candidates may make green policies part of deciding which companies to work for and current employees seek pastures new if they’re not happy.  But now employees’ views have gained a lot more weight in the UK.  The Guardian reported this morning on a case that gave convictions around climate change the status of a religious belief in employment law.   

The story (as reported in The Guardian here) is that Tim Nicholson, when head of sustainability at property firm Grainger, fell out with other managers because of what he felt was contempt for his views.  The example quoted was that when the CEO of the company went on a business trip to Ireland and left his Blackberry in London, he sent one of his staff back, by plane, to retrieve it.

When Nicholson was subsequently made redundant he launched a legal action claiming he was sacked for his beliefs, citing the obstruction he had encountered in his job, the contempt he felt and the phone incident.  Grainger objected to the case being heard at an employment tribunal on the grounds that green views did not equate with religious or philosophical beliefs, but today’s ruling allowed the tribunal to go ahead.

The Guardian quotes the judge as saying: "A belief in man-made climate change, and the alleged resulting moral imperatives, is capable if genuinely held, of being a philosophical belief for the purpose of the 2003 Religion and Belief Regulations", which means that such beliefs are protected under laws preventing discrimination.

(Interestingly, the paper also pointed out that the same judge ruled that Al Gore's ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ was political and partisan in a ruling about its use in schools).

Anyway, it now seems that employees in the UK have potentially a lot more legal support in putting their views across, and having them respected, in the work environment.  Yet more pressure on companies to go green.

Climate change impact map

The UK government and the Met Office have launched an interactive map that illustrates the consequences of global temperature change above 2°C.  Based on the latest climate change science, it highlights a range of impacts, including forest fires, crop production, water availability, sea level rises, extreme temperatures, water shortages, etc.

The four degree average rise map highlights the fact that the impact will not be spread uniformly around the globe -land will heat up more quickly than the sea and high latitudes, particularly the Arctic, will have larger temperature increases.

The map is part of the UK governments efforts to steer the climate change talks in Copenhagen towards limiting climate change to 2 °C, given the impact of higher temperatures.  This seems an increasingly unlikely target, though, given the limited global action to date and the lack of will to reach an international agreement.

Vicky Pope, Head of Climate Change Advice at the Met Office, said: “If emissions continue at the current rate the global average temperature are likely to rise by 4°C by the end of this century or even substantially earlier. The science tells us that this will have severe and widespread impacts in all parts of the world, so we need to take action now to reduce emissions to avoid water and food shortages in the future.”

The full interactive map, which has lots of associated information based on geography and type of impact (a great teaching aid) is here.  Don’t get too depressed.

Sustainable product development software

Sustainable Minds, a greener product design software and services company, has released Sustainable Minds 1.0, a software-as-a-service (SaaS) solution for creating more environmentally sustainable products.  

The solution integrates software with educational content to help with product design and to measure the potential environmental and human health impacts.  The life cycle assessment is based on the Okala Methodology, which evaluates 10 environmental impact categories in the areas of ecological damage, human health damage and resource depletion.  The software provides quantified performance metrics to help the design decisions.

Sustainable Minds 1.0 can be used to assess the impact of an existing or new product and can also be used alongside CAD tools. It interoperates with any CAD or PLM system.

 

The software is optimised for electro-mechanical products, including household appliances, consumer electronics, industrial and commercial equipment, etc. It’s aimed at product designers, engineers, product managers, marketers and sustainability leads in manufacturing companies and consultancies.

This is another example of a new product embracing the increasing environmental demands of its target market.  Established CAD and PLM suppliers will also be addressing sustainable requirements, but experience suggests they won’t be the quickest to respond.  Sustainable Minds may well fall to a larger, slower competitor in the long run.

Google Powermeter comes to the UK

On Wednesday of last week, first:utility, a UK energy company, announced that it had become the first UK partner for Google’s PowerMeter.  As we covered in a previous blog, PowerMeter is an application that allows users to see a near real-time display of their energy
usage on their computers or mobile phones.

first:utility is a new residential energy supplier, having launched into the sector just over a year ago.  It now has 30,000 customers and claims to be the only UK energy supplier to provide free smart meters, which it is rolling out across the UK.  Currently, customers can get energy usage patterns from a Home Display Unit or usage and cost information online from the first:utility web site.  PowerMeter is an alternative means to view and manage energy consumption.  The PowerMeter service will be free and is due to go live this month.

Ed Lu, Google PowerMeter’s lead engineer, said: “We share a vision with first:utility of providing consumers with access to information about their own home electricity use that will help them save energy and money. We need the help of innovative utility companies like first:utility to get Google
PowerMeter into the hands of consumers, and we are delighted about this very first UK utility partnership.”

On the same day, AlertMe, a home energy management service company, announced the launch of an online energy monitoring service called AlertMe Energy.  The service includes the self-install hardware – a meter reader that clips on to the home electric meter plus a hub that plugs into the broadband connection - with web browser-based monitoring integrated with PowerMeter.  The company says it’s the first self-install consumer device company to partner with Google and the only one with a product available in the UK.

The point here is that with devices like AlertMe consumers don't need a smart meter installed to monitor energy usage and to use PowerMeter.  Here’s Google’s Ed Lu again: “The combination of AlertMe and Google PowerMeter gives consumers a complete solution for monitoring home energy use and costs. We want to empower consumers to take energy information into their own hands and we are excited to work closely with AlertMe on this initiative.”

AlertMe has announced a trial with British Gas to provide AlertMe Smart Home Energy products in UK homes, which means that AlertMe Energy can be purchased directly from British Gas.  AlertMe Energy costs £69.00 for the basic hardware plus £2.99 per month for the online service (the press release quotes an annual service cost of £99.00, but that, hopefully, is a mistake.  There won’t be many takers otherwise).

These two announcements underline the different approaches to empowering consumers to monitor and manage their energy usage - either with smart meters or without.  But whichever route is used, Google is likely to be supplying the software at the end of it.  It didn’t get so big by accident.

SAP puts sustainability in its EcoHub

SAP has announced an online marketplace for sustainability solutions.  It’s part of the SAP EcoHub, a web resource for customers to find solutions from SAP and its partners.  The move follows on from an announcement back in April that the company and some key members of its ecosystem were forming a new Green IT community.

The interactive sustainability map for the EcoHub is designed to provide a clear view of the sustainability/Green IT solutions and services available from SAP and its partners.  All the solutions are certified by SAP.  By clicking on an area of interest on the map customers can find out more about (and buy) the solutions and services on offer to help them with their sustainability strategy.

SAP lists a number of partners helping it produce sustainability products and services, including Accenture, Atos Origin, Carbon Development Project, CSC, Deloitte Consulting LLP, EMC, ENFOS, IBM, Linx/AS, Nakisa, NetApp, PROLOGA, SmartOps, StreamServe, TechniData and VMware.

 

Long-term readers (and there’s quite a few of you out there now) will know that I’ve had my reservations about SAP’s green IT efforts in the past.  For an IT supplier providing core systems to many corporations the company seemed slow and complacent in addressing the market.

But this year SAP has been much more pro-active in its approach, announcing a long term strategic focus on sustainability.  The approach has included acquiring Clear Standards, a US company providing enterprise carbon management solutions, working with the CDP on a new reporting system and the company has endorsed the Copenhagen Communiqué on Climate Change.