CompTIA launches green IT certification

Last week CompTIA, the global IT trade association, announced the worldwide availability of its CompTIA Strata – Green IT certification program.

The Green IT certificate is designed for individuals looking to demonstrate that they have the knowledge and skills to implement environmentally sound green IT techniques.  It’s intended for decision-making IT professionals who have authority over a company’s IT infrastructure, i.e. IT managers, supervisors, data centre managers or facilities and operations managers.

The exam includes 30 questions, which must be completed in 60 minutes, and covers green technologies, techniques, standards and policies.  It includes issues such as saving power; reducing an organisation’s carbon footprint; identifying green IT organisations and standards; implementing virtualisation; disposal; and calculating the ROI in green IT initiatives. 

“To fulfil the promise of green IT, technology professionals must add new skills unique to its environment,” said Terry Erdle, senior vice president, skills certifications, CompTIA. “We’re taking a big step in that direction through the training around CompTIA Strata – Green IT and the validation delivered by this important new program.”

The certificate comes on the back of the 2009 CompTIA study Green IT: Insights and Opportunities, which showed that 40% of IT service suppliers provide energy audits to clients; 26% offer carbon footprint measuring and monitoring services;  and 23% plan to offer these services within the next two years.

 

This is clearly a move in the right direction.  Various qualifications have already been introduced, including from the British Computer Society, but a globally available certification will help create a more universal baseline of knowledge (although the exam seems to be only available in English). 

I have two reservations, though.  Firstly, green IT is a big subject and it’s not clear exactly what will be included in the certification. It would also be useful to have some reassurance that the qualification is being kept up to date. There are various aspects to green IT and technology developments will have an impact.

Secondly, IT reflects the business and the business reflects regulation and legislation. As carbon laws come in, so will IT have to adapt and change.  That’s a national issue requiring some local input to training.

Vodafone wins smart meter contract with British Gas

Vodafone UK has won a contract to support British Gas in the roll out of smart metering in the UK.  The exact value has not been released, but the ‘multi-million pound’ contract will see the company provide nearly a million GPRS connections within household utility meters to send real-time energy use data back to British Gas.

The announcement focuses in on the convenience as the main benefit.  Customers will no longer need to be in attendance for someone to read their meter, since bills will be automatically generated from the data sent back by the meter.  But this is the first stage of a process to enable customers to be much more aware of energy use in real time, with the potential to adjust usage accordingly.  Combined with differential tariffs in the future, it’s seen as an effective way to reduce energy use and hence emissions.

In December the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) announced its programme for the implementation of smart meters in the UK.  The plan is that all homes will have smart gas and electricity meters, supplied by their energy suppliers, by the end of 2020.  That’s 47 million meters in 26 million properties at a cost of £8.6bn.  This British Gas/Vodafone contract is a trial.

Personal conviction drives business climate change action

The Economist Intelligence Unit has published a report on business sentiment around climate change.  Called ‘After Copenhagen – Business and climate change’, it’s based primarily on a survey of 542 senior executives worldwide.  More than a quarter were CEOs and a similar proportion were in other C-level roles.

The full report, which was sponsored by 1E, the Carbon Trust, IBM and Hitachi, can be downloaded from here, but the main findings included the following:

• Climate change action in business has reached an impasse. Almost one third (32%) of respondents said they do not yet have a coherent strategy in place to address energy consumption issues.

• More than half (52%) of respondents believe the ‘jury is still out’ on the seriousness of climate change (against 31% who disagree).

• Companies where executives believe in the science of climate change tend to do far more on the issue.  They also seem more likely to reap the benefits; “Far more companies with believers have actually developed new ‘green’ products and services”.

• Seven in ten respondents (71%) maintained that carbon reduction policies are primarily driven by public relations.

• However, 59% of executives see cutting carbon as an opportunity to gain a competitive advantage over rivals over and above the PR benefit, and a range of companies have built major businesses on the back of new environmental products and services.

• Unclear regulation is the biggest barrier to greater climate change action by businesses – who want more direction. But 46% of those polled are now more pessimistic about the ability of their government to deal with climate change, especially in an international context.

 

An interesting study.  The first thing to note is that the survey was conducted just after the Copenhagen climate summit ended in January and not long after ‘ClimateGate’ hit the headlines, so the news was pretty negative.  I guess that partly explains the mixed messages, particularly the disillusionment with government action.

The survey results do seem to point to a polarisation of views (and actions).  There’s still a significant proportion of companies with no energy consumption strategy and more than half harbour doubts about the evidence on climate change.  Nevertheless most see the PR value in taking some action and the majority think that doing so can give them a competitive advantage. 

But what’s most intriguing for me is that personal attitudes, over and above business responsibilities, do seem to have an impact on how companies behave.  Moreover, companies where executives believe in the science of climate change are more likely to take action and seize the business opportunities it represents.  Or to put it the other way round, climate change sceptics are potentially damaging the companies they work for.

But if your selling green IT products and services, it may be that getting the prospect’s climate change champion on side is as important as the business case.

Green IT - change font

The University of Wisconsin, Green Bay, has come up with a novel way of making its IT greener (and also shrinking its budget).  The suggestion was made to use a font that consumes less ink and toner, which is exactly what they’ve done.  The default font for Outlook across campus was changed to Century Gothic.

The University maintains that Century Gothic uses 30% less ink than Arial, the most commonly used default font.  Ink costs the university around $10,000 a gallon, with toner cartridges and drums not far behind, and accounts for 60% of the cost of the printed page, so it’s potentially a significant saving across a university campus.

This is a great example of using the default option as a means to nudge people towards greener behaviour.  There’s no force involved - the University made it clear that users can change back to a different default font if you wish. 

Arguably you shouldn’t be printing out emails anyway, but there are always some that you need to take with you.  In any case, the university is also encourage everyone to switch to Century Gothic as their default font in Entourage for Macintosh, Word, and Excel (not something that could easily be implemented universally).

If you want to go even further, there are even specially designed green fonts (with holes in!), but the beauty of the University of Wisconsin’s approach is that it’s so simple.

eRecyclingCorps helps Sprint’s environmental ambitions

A new company has been formed specifically to address the 65,000 tons of mobile phone e-waste created each year in the US. Called eRecyclingCorps, it’s a venture-backed company co-founded by two industry veterans, David Edmondson, the CEO, was previously CEO of RadioShack, and Chairman Ron LeMay was formerly President and COO of Sprint.

Apparently, of the 4 billion wireless subscribers in the world, only 1% recycle their handsets. In the US alone, 130 million phones are retired each year.  It’s eRecyclingCorps aim to help tier one wireless carriers buy back used handsets from consumers and ensure they are resold or recycled. With significant residual value in used mobile devices, there is an economic opportunity for all involved, as well as the environmental benefit.

eRecyclingCorps is not the first company to recycle mobiles, but it is the first to work with carriers. The company uses a web-based platform that integrates directly into the point of sale system at carrier retail stores, where 60% of all US phones are sold. It offers consumer trade-in incentives, in-store collection and privacy as an integral part of every phone purchase.

Sprint, not surprisingly, is the first carrier to use eRecyclingCorps, which has been deployed in 1,100 company stores, 1,400 dealers and through its online channels.  Sprint wants to achieve a wireless reuse and recycling rate of 90% by 2017.

Sprint has reinforced its environmental commitment recently.  In February the company’s CEO testified to the US Senate Commerce Subcommittee on Communications, Technology and the Internet about sustainability initiatives from Sprint and the wireless technology industry as a whole.  He announced the mobile buy-back scheme and also that Sprint is the first US wireless carrier to establish a set of green design criteria for consumer devices. In the future every handset vendor who manufactures handsets to operate on Sprint's networks must produce handsets that meet or exceed Sprint's new green specifications. 

 

E-waste is becoming a growing ICT focus not just because of increasing (and stricter) legislation but also because there’s money in recycling.  ICT suppliers want to achieve targets but offload the day-to-day process – it’s not core business – so this is fertile territory for new businesses and innovation.  Hence the emergence of venture-backed start-ups with the opportunity to generate significant revenue from what is a fundamental part of green ICT. Eventually I would expect these operations to be bought out by larger recycling groups as the industry as a whole matures.

Intel launches the ‘Westmere’ energy-saving chip

Intel has launched a new processor series, the Xeon Processor 5600, based on new 32nm logic technology to increase speed and decrease energy consumption.

Previously code-named Westmere, the new chip boasts increased security capabilities and 60% greater performance than previous generation processors through up to six-core embedded computing.  Data centres can replace 15 single-core servers with one server with a rapid ROI.

In terms of power efficiency, a two-socket server using the low-voltage Intel Xeon processor L5640 can deliver the same performance as a server using the champion of the previous X5570 series, but with up to 30% lower platform power.

The new processors also offer better virtualisation performance and generally increase the reliability and manageability of consolidated IT environments.

For the technically-minded there’s a lot more information in the press release.  Suffice to say that a number of manufacturers have already introducing new energy-efficient hardware based on the chip, including Dell, Cisco, IBM and Fujitsu.

AT&T launches zero charger – could save $12bn of electricity a year

AT&T and Superior Communications have announced the AT&T ZERO charger, which doesn’t waste power when left plugged in and improves charging efficiency when powering a device.

The ZERO charger works by cutting the power supply from the wall socket when it detects that charger is not plugged into a mobile phone. The ‘block and cable’ design also enables increased interchangeability, which means that the same charger can be used for future handsets, cutting the number of chargers produced and reducing landfill waste.

The charger will be on sale in May and cost the same as existing replacement chargers.  It also has a 5-star efficiency rating, which exceeds the standards set by GSMA.

It looks like an interesting little device and some of the details on charger energy use that AT&T has been using show the benefit.

According to the US Department of Energy, the total amount of electricity that flows through internal and external power adapters in the US is nearly 470 billion kWh per year or about 12% of the nation's annual electricity consumption.  The adapters themselves consume about 120 billion kWh per year of electricity, costing over $12 billion in electric bills. 

The wasted electricity each day from chargers left plugged into a wall in the US is enough to power 24,000 homes for a year, or brew three to four million cups of coffee each day.

So if you’re talking about green ICT in terms of reducing the power that ICT consumes, the charger is a good place to start.

Green IT Awareness Week web site launched

A web site dedicated to International Green IT Awareness Week was launched today.  Green IT Awareness Week will run from 1-7 June 2010 and is described as a collaborative initiative consisting of in-person and online seminars and activities across the globe.  It’s hosted by Australian not-for-profit organisation ComputersOff.org.

Bianca Wirth, CEO of ComputersOff.org, said that organisations were missing a centralised, cohesive initiative which will enable them to both understand the benefits, challenges and cultural changes required for green IT, and appreciate the current research enabling them to plan for the future.  “Now, through International Green IT Awareness Week everyone can learn about practical implementation of environmentally sustainable IT practices they can undertake today.  International Green IT Awareness Week will feature expert researchers, green IT specialists, IT vendors and manufacturers, and organisations who have already successfully implemented their own green IT initiatives in a single intensive week,” she added.

It sounds like a great initiative and joins another online conference on next week - Sustainability Virtual Summits – Smart ICT.  My only reservation is that the event was described as ‘Australia’s’ inaugural International Green IT Awareness Week and the press release featured an Australian politician.  Sounds more local than global.

Big names in smart grids – offerings from Accenture and Capgemini

As if to confirm my comments yesterday about competition in smart grids, two mainstream IT/consultancies have since announced new offerings:

• Accenture has launched Intelligent Network Data Enterprise (INDE), a data management platform aimed at helping utilities design, deploy and manage smart grids.

David M Rouls, managing director, Accenture Smart Grid Services is quoted as saying “A smart grid is expected to generate up to eight orders of magnitude more data than today’s traditional power network. Transforming and analysing this data into useful business and operational intelligence is one of the biggest challenges facing our industry today”.  That’s what INDE addresses.

It comprises a suite of applications, tools, databases, analytics and processes that enable utilities to manage and analyse the real-time data generated by the multitude of sources in a smart grid network.  Accenture says the INDE solution plays three critical roles:

- The software layer between raw data from the grid and the utility’s existing operations and IT systems.

- The integration platform, bringing together smart grid infrastructure such as meters, network components and sensors.

- Providing a platform for analytics and graphical representations to derive insight from raw data.

Interestingly, this is a standards-based solution architecture that can be enabled by an array of third party technologies.  But Accenture also plans to offer utilities the option of implementing the solution based on a pre-configured suite of Oracle technologies.

 

• Capgemini has announced the launch of Smart Energy Services, a new service line that offering the full spectrum of smart metering, smart grid, smart home solutions and smart analytics. This seems to be the company pulling together all the services and best practices that it has employed in North America and Europe for the last five years or so into one, unified global offering. 

Central to the service line is the company’s Managed Business Services, a usage-based pricing model which means that utilities can reduce the risk and minimise the upfront cost.

Capgemini also emphasises the partnership aspect, pointing out that clients will benefit from its relationships with the likes of Cisco, GE Energy, HP, Intel, Itron, Landis+Gyr, Oracle, SAP AG and Trilliant. Capgemini (and many of its partners) are founding members of the Smart Energy Alliance (SEA).

Trilliant integrates distribution and metering smart grid networks

Smart grid solutions company Trilliant has announced the SecureMesh Bridge products, which integrate a Wide Area Network (WAN) for distribution and a Neighbourhood Area Network (NAN) for metering.  The product is a direct result of Trilliant's acquisition last year of wireless equipment company SkyPilot and Trilliant claims that it’s the first fully-integrated private WAN/NAN solution for the smart grid industry.

 

Trilliant maintains that there are several advantages to this integrated network solution.  Firstly, it provides a dedicated private network, so there are no cellular costs (and uncertain coverage) to contend with.  It also extends connectivity right down to distribution, metering and consumer applications.  In addition, the integrated network uses multiple virtual network domains to ensure end-to-end security and Quality-of-Service (QoS) guarantees for each Smart Grid application. 

There are a variety of ways that you can build the ICT infrastructure that’s an essential part of smart grids and there’s no single right solution.  Much will depend on specific utility requirements and the IT/telecoms infrastructure already in place.  There’s going to be a lot of competition, with partnerships forming and reforming between major ICT companies around specific, significant market opportunities. 

Trilliant has a head start as a market specialist, though, and the focus on security and quality of service in this announcement is going to play to the concerns of many utilities.

Google Maps adds biking directions

As yet it’s only in the US, but as of March 10th Google Maps has included biking directions and bike trail data. 

It’s been a while in coming – there was a 50,000+ signature petition to get bike routes included.  Google says it wanted to be sure it was right before launching, which meant allowing riders to customise their trip, making use of bike lanes, calculating rider-friendly routes that avoid big hills and including as much bike trail data as possible. 

The net result is that the biking directions can help find a convenient and efficient route that makes use of dedicated bike trails or lanes and avoids hills whenever possible.  Time estimates are based on a set of variables accounting for the type of road, terrain and turns over the ride.

There are more than 12,000 miles of trails included in biking directions and outlined directly on the map.  There is also data on bike lanes and recommended streets for 150 cities across the US.

A great move from Google.  One of requirements before they launched was to ‘customise the look of the map for cycling to encourage folks to hop on their bikes’.  That’s going above and beyond providing the raw biking data that would have satisfied the petitioners.  It’s the sort of positive nudge towards biking that can encourage people to have a go and become greener citizens.

No precise information as to what countries will be included next, but http://googlemapsbikethere.org/ says ‘hopefully’ Canada, Mexico, France, Italy, the rest of Europe and the rest of the world.

Microsoft product measures software energy use.

GreenIT.fr has picked up on a recent announcement by Microsoft of a new product that will measure the energy efficiency of software.

The Joulemeter solution, announced at Microsoft’s recent TechFest event, measures the energy usage of virtual machines, servers, desktops, laptops and even individual pieces of software.  According to the limited information from Microsoft that I could find, Joulemeter estimates the energy usage by measuring the hardware resources (CPU, disk, memory, screen, etc.) being used and converting it to actual power usage based on automatically learned power models.

Microsoft maintains that the software can be used for gaining visibility into energy use and for making power management and provisioning decisions in data centres, client computing, and software design.

The company says that a freely downloadable version of the Joulemeter software, for measuring laptop and desktop energy usage, will be be available in a few weeks.  (GreenIT.fr says April 1st).

This is interesting because of its focus on software energy use in general and virtual machines in particular.  To date the focus in reducing IT power consumption has been primarily on the hardware – more energy efficient machines, consolidation, virtualisation, etc.  This is fairly easy stuff that many would argue should have been done before, given the cost savings.

But things will get harder.  Because the use of IT can only increase (and should increase, in order to enable carbon savings elsewhere), the underlying power requirement is on an inexorable upward climb.  But there will continue to be pressure on IT departments to minimise power use, so the focus will increasingly drill down to hardware component level and software.  There has already been some concern that the sprawl of virtual machines is creating its own problems, so this Microsoft offering may help get a handle on the issue.

It sounds like a fairly crude solution (apologies if I’m wrong but there’s not much info) but will undoubtedly be followed by increasingly sophisticated tools.

Enviance launches an EPA reporting solution

Environmental ERP software provider Enviance has announced the launch of its 60-day Greenhouse Gas (GHG) FastTrack program designed to help companies comply with the US Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) air emissions reporting requirements.

The new regulation went into effect on January 1st and at the time of its announcement the program was expected to cover around 10,000 facilities and account for around 85% of US emissions.  For many facilities it will be the first time that have needed to keep track of, and report on, their greenhouse gases.  The first reporting deadline is March 31, 2011, for the 2010 fiscal year - companies found in non-compliance will be subject to significant penalties.

Enviance describes the benefits:

• A turn-key (online) GHG solution

• Fully implemented in 60 days or less, supported by Enviance consultants

• Online training

• The basis of a full EHS and Enterprise Sustainability solution

• Competitive fixed cost model (from $1,995/month)

• Able to scale to meet user expansion requirements

 

A press release with the announcement quoted a recent Enviance survey that showed that 61% of companies lack systems in place to record carbon emissions: ‘a large number of companies will be scrambling to implement auditable GHG measurement and reporting tools or risk serious fines’.  This is the market that Enviance is aiming for with this ‘peace-of-mind’ solution.

The company certainly has the pedigree.  It’s been in the business for ten years and was identified as one of the emerging leaders in a Groom Energy Research report into the Enterprise Carbon Accounting (ECA) software market. 

But note that eight companies were identified as emerging leaders in the report.  Enviance may win business on the grounds that it’s a safe pair of hands and fulfils an immediate requirement, but it’s likely to encounter a lot of competition when the market has settled.  The stand-alone carbon counting software market may well turn into a price-based war of attrition.

By the way, the Groom Energy Research report (in January) said that increased pressure from customers and investors for companies to create a ‘greener’ public image was a more important market driver than pending GHG regulation.  Probably true over the long term, but legislation will clearly generate spikes in demand.

Fujitsu achieves Carbon Trust Standard

Fujitsu UK and Ireland has achieved the ‘Carbon Trust Standard’ for reducing its carbon footprint. The Carbon Trust is a not-for-profit company set up by the UK Government to take the lead in helping businesses and the public sector cut carbon emissions and save energy. 

The Carbon Trust Standard was launched in June 2008.  The award to Fujitsu was in recognition of a ‘robust and transparent’ process for measuring emissions and clear progress in reducing its carbon footprint.  The emissions reduction was 1.7%. 

In achieving the standard Fujitsu joins household names in the UK such as First Direct, Tesco and O2, and public sector organisations such as HM Treasury, London Fire Brigade and Manchester University.

 

I know what you’re thinking – 1.7% doesn’t sound like much (although it does represent 1,483.7 tonnes of carbon), but that’s not the whole story. The Carbon Trust Standard is strict in requiring organisations to measure, manage and reduce their carbon footprint and make real reductions year-on-year.  So the quoted reduction only relates to what was achieved as the result of the company’s own actions – on a like-for-like basis for example. 

In particular it’s only internal actions that count, not offsets, which continue to be a bone of contention in carbon reduction.  (Interestingly, the UK government itself has a target of making its ICT carbon neutral by 2012, something which is unlikely to be achieved without purchasing offsets).

So the Carbon Trust Standard is as much about transparency, independent certification and real emissions reductions.  It puts a very visible peg in the ground against which future actions will be measured, which is something Fujitsu will have to live up to.

Australia starts work on new data centre metrics

itnews in Australia reports that that the Federal and State governments have come together to develop new metrics to measure energy efficiency in data centres.

There is already a National Australian Built Environment Rating System (NABERS) - similar to the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) from the US Green Building Council – managed by the NSW Department of Environment, Climate Change and Water (DECCW).  But a data centre is a very different beast, in terms of power consumption, to your average building, so specific metrics for data centres are to be added.

Two companies have been chosen to develop the metrics; Xergy, which helped develop NABERS, and Connection Research, which specialises in analysis of sustainability issues.  Connection Research has put together a Technical Advisory Group (TAG) to provide input to the methodology for developing the metrics. 

I’ve said before that I’m not keen on the proliferation of standards around green IT – the more universal measures are then the more likely they are to be adopted, particularly internationally.  But the PUE (Power Usage Effectiveness) measure from the Green Grid is pretty crude, a ratio of the total data centre power to what’s used by the IT equipment.  There are a number of issues around the way it’s measured and, in particular, in comparing data centres.  It doesn’t, for instance, take into consideration increased utilisation rates through virtualisation, or any additional levels of reliability/availability that are built in.

As Graeme Philipson, Research Director at Connection Research pointed out, there are other organisations around the world looking at better data centre metrics, including the Green Grid itself and the British Computer Society.  Hopefully emerging metrics will be compatible, as well as taking into consideration existing guidelines on data centre operation, for example the EU Data Centre Code of Conduct.  But then, having worked with Connection Research on other aspects of green IT assessment, I’m sure they’ll do a thorough job.

Sustainability and employee involvement

The US National Environmental Education Foundation (NEEF) has released a study entitled ‘The Business Case for Environmental and Sustainability Employee Education’.  The full study is here, but basically it found that training staff and getting them involved in environmental and sustainability (E&S) initiatives helps companies achieve a range of business objectives from attracting and retaining employees to boosting the bottom line.

“ …. many companies now realise that to achieve their sustainability goals, they need to involve the entire workforce (or all their employees),” said Diane Wood, president of NEEF. “Successful employee engagement programs motivate employees and can be an asset in recruitment and retention."

But the study also concluded that since educational programs compete for resources, a strong business case can be as important as building the program itself.  In terms of making the business case, the report cites best practice as linking E&S education initiatives to business objectives, stressing the shift in societal and stakeholder expectations and taking a top-down, bottom-up and sideways approach when engaging employees (that should cover everything!).

In terms of the program itself, the study recommends:

• Building momentum by recognising work that is already being done.

• Creating E&S education pilot programs to build the case for a larger program.

• Understanding that each geographic region has its
unique problems and opportunities.

• Complementing education with incentives.

• Regularly reporting back to employees on how their actions are making a difference.

 

When I came across this study I was reminded of the old saying that 90% of market research is simply to confirm what you already know.  It seems pretty obvious that corporate environmental initiatives need employee buy-in and education is an important part of establishing that buy-in.  In the green IT context, for example, it needs employees to understand the impact of turning off PC’s, printing less, etc. and the direct and indirect benefits to them.  In many aspects of internal environmental and sustainability policy employees may not see any direct benefits either to the company or its staff.

In terms of green IT, employees also need help in adopting the right practices.  For example in making the default option for PCs to shut down when not in use and duplex printing the norm.  Education is important, but there also needs to be processes and choices in place to help them achieve the objectives. 

Last but not least, there is a chicken-and-egg issue here.  If you really need people with the expertise to take green initiatives forward, then you need to show commitment, which means having the capability in-house … 

Google releases Powermeter API – a Smart move

Google has made available the application programming interface (API) for its Powermeter – which we first reported on more than a year ago.  The Powermeter helps users monitor their energy use and cost, either overall or by device.

Making the API available means that developers can integrate the software with their applications and products.  Hence device manufacturers will be able to incorporate the ability to work with the software at the time of manufacture.

Up till now Powermeter relied on Google’s utility or device partners to supply the energy data, but Google said that it’s launching the API “in order to help build the ecosystem of innovative developers working towards making energy information more widely available to consumers”.

It’s an interesting move by Google and may have more significance than at first sight.  The company would like to see electrical equipment manufacturers incorporate Powermeter compatible in a range of home devices, such as refrigerators and washing machines.  Building in such capabilities has already started - US company Whirlpool anticipates selling a million smart-grid-ready clothes dryers by the end of 2011.  The company is part of the Smart Green Grid Initiative in the US.

By making the API available, Google is hoping its software will end up at the heart of the smart device movement.  And with smart grids seen as a possible element of, or stepping stone to, the ill-defined but potentially all-pervasive Internet of Things, Google may just have planted a seed that could bear significant fruit.

It’s likely, though, that the company could also find itself at the centre of another privacy and security row.  There is already significant concern about privacy issues around smart grids and smart meters, causing some resistance to their adoption around the world.  It seems that people don’t want others to know how much energy their using, although I would have thought there were much greater privacy issues to worry about first.

Deloitte expands its sustainability practice with the acquisition of dcarbon8

Deloitte has acquired UK carbon and sustainability consultancy firm dcarbon8. The company will be absorbed within Deloitte’s expanding environmental and sustainability consulting practice.

dcarbon8 provides carbon footprinting and management, supply chain carbon assessment, sustainability strategies and environmental communications strategies (for which read PR).  It has the capability to deliver Carbon Trust and Planet Positive certification of products, businesses and buildings as part of its services. Deloitte particularly pointed to dcarbon8’s expertise in carbon footprint, water and sustainability advisory services as being complementary to its own.

Sustainability is an area that’s ripe for consultancy at all levels – from global strategy in the face of uncertain carbon legislation down to product lifecycle carbon assessment, so it’s no surprise that all the consultancy firms are building their businesses.  If the financial climate had been better we would have seen a lot more of these small specialist firms snapped up in the last couple of years. 

The economic climate also explains why IT services companies have not been on the acquisition trail of similar boutique firms.  With IT playing a significant role in reducing emissions throughout corporations, I still expect to see such acquisitions in the next year or two as part of their green IT push.

Vodafone heads ICT sustainability league table

Sustainability consultancy Two Tomorrows has a tool called Tomorrow’s Value Rating that rates companies on how well they manage social and environmental issues.  The methodology focuses on five areas; strategy, governance, engagement, value chain and innovation.  The company regularly publishes information on the largest companies in different industry sectors.  The latest is in the ICT sector. 

Vodafone is top of the list, with an overall score of 60%, which Two Tomorrows attributes to its ‘strong, all-round sustainability leadership’.  Thomas Krick, global manager of the Tomorrow’s Value programme, commented that: “Vodafone has implemented comprehensive governance mechanisms for sustainability issues. It listens and responds to stakeholders both locally and globally, and has a strong track record of developing services that help improve the lives of disadvantaged people and remote communities.”

Vodafone is followed closely by Nokia and HP, with Sony, AT&T and Verizon trailing at the foot of the table – Verizon scoring just 23%.

 

A detailed overall assessment of the companies is here, but Two Tomorrows concludes that the sustainability leaders in ICT are developing products and services to support the response to climate change and ICT companies as a whole are showing sustainability leadership.  Nevertheless, there is considerable room for the sector to improve its management of its direct environmental impacts.

The analysis is worth reading, but I thought the press release was spot on with a couple of quotes.  Thomas Krick went on to say: “The results of the Rating reflect a broader trend of ICT companies showing sustainability leadership. They are increasingly recognising the commercial opportunity that lies in helping other sectors to reduce their carbon footprint ….  Companies in the sector are also working together, especially in trying to address social and environmental challenges in their supply chains, and in regard to electronic waste management.”

However, Jason Perks, group director at Two Tomorrows, added: “While the sector continues to push best practice in sustainability innovation, the management of its direct environmental impacts often offers room for improvement. For example, while most companies have set CO2 emissions targets, the majority struggle to achieve significant reductions.

Together I think the two comments are a pretty good summary of the where the industry is in terms of green ICT.

The GreenRoad to success

It’s good to report on successful small technology companies in the green space and one of those seems to be GreenRoad.

The company has a solution called GreenRoad 360, which basically monitors vehicle and driver performance.  The company’s technology measures 120 separate live driving events in five categories: speed handling, cornering, land handling, braking and acceleration. The data provides the driver with immediate feedback and is also transmitted back to the GreenRoad servers, where a web site provides real-time reports and analysis.  Managers and drivers can use the information to assess how they are driving, how driving habits can be improved and to analyse risk.

It looks to be primarily aimed at fleet owners, helping improve driving behaviour, reduce crashes and reduce operating costs, but clearly it has a significant role in increasing fuel economy and reducing emissions. 

 

The company’s green credentials are evident from the fact that it is backed by Virgin Green Fund and a couple of weeks ago Al Gore’s Generation Investment management LLP put $10m into the company to support further expansion.

Last November the company was recognised as one of the top 30 fastest-growing cleantech businesses in Europe at the inaugural GP Bullhound Cleantech Connect event.  It was also chosen to receive an additional award for Vision and Future Growth Potential. 

Clearly green ICT investment can bring significant rewards.

Apple sends mixed environmental messages

As foreseen in a post in January, Apple’s has rejected two resolutions at its shareholders’ meeting calling for the publication of a sustainability report and the creation of a Board Committee on Sustainability.  It seems even odder given that Al Gore was re-elected to the board at the same meeting, although there was some criticism of the appointment. 

Whilst the outcome may not have been ideal, quite a lot of the meeting was apparently spent addressing environmental issues, which sends a signal to other companies that the issues can’t be ignored.

Apple did, though, highlight its 2010 Supplier Responsibility report.  The report shows that in 2009 the company conducted audits at 102 facilities, including annual audits of all final assembly manufacturers, first-time audits of component and nonproduction suppliers and 15 repeat audits of facilities where a core violation had previously been discovered.  The audits check for compliance with Apple’s Supplier Code of Conduct, which suppliers have to sign up to as a condition of their contracts.  The Code covers labour and human rights, health and safety, the environment, ethics, and management systems.

The 2009 audits identified 17 core violations: eight violations involving excessive recruitment fees; three cases where underage workers had been hired; three cases where suppliers contracted with noncertified vendors for hazardous waste disposal; and three cases of falsified records provided during the audit.

Overall, from 2007 to the end of 2009, Apple audited 190 facilities located in China, the Czech Republic, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, and the United States. 

The 24-page Supplier Responsibility report is clearly a good thing and a commendable effort by Apple, but for me it highlights even more the company’s strange resistance to publishing a sustainability report.  I don’t think even Apple can hold out for much longer.