GLOBE has published a study of climate change legislation

The Global Legislators Organisation (GLOBE) has published a study into the status of climate change legislation in 16 of the world’s largest economies. 

GLOBE International was founded in 1989 by legislators from the US Congress, European Parliament, Japanese Diet and the Russian State Duma with the aim of coordinating national environmental policy through legislation.

The full study is available to download here, but the findings include:

• Most of the national legislative activity has taken place over the last year and a half – during which time international negotiations have stalled. The study concludes that this is due to the realisation that acting on climate change is in the national interest

• Large developing countries - Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa – are implementing comprehensive laws to tackle climate change.

• While current legislation does not yet add up to what is necessary to avoid dangerous climate change, the legislation is putting in place the legal frameworks to measure, report, verify and manage carbon

• An international climate change agreement will only be possible when countries are already committed to taking the necessary action.

 

The study does show that, despite scepticism and lack of international agreement, the world is adopting climate legislation, albeit too slowly. It’s not the sudden shift anticipated a few years ago, but it is happening.

It does mean growing opportunities for green ICT to help support the low carbon moves of these economies, particularly the compliance requirements of legislation. The report gives some detail of what the various legislations entail, but note that it’s just for the 16; Brazil, Canada, China, European Union, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Russia, South Africa, South Korea, UK, USA.

The British Computer Society is looking for the environmental project of the year

BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT, has begun the search for the winner of its environmental project of the year award, part of the BCS UK IT Industry Awards.                                            

The judges are looking for the best project which has, in the last 12 months, used technology to benefit the environment. They are particularly looking for success in reducing energy consumption, shrinking carbon footprints, reducing waste, cutting raw material usage, or motivating positive change in attitudes.

Last year the environmental award was collected by MSM Software for their Devon County Council Car Park Management System (CPMS).

The objective was to advance the Council's environmental objectives and set an example to other employers. The scheme involved the introduction of a travel plan for County Hall which included chargeable staff parking and restricted each member of staff to parking three days per week.  The charges were used to provide staff with alternative green travel options on their non-car days. MSM wrote the entire ecommerce platform to allow staff to pay for parking in advance, integrated payment with the payroll and staff identity smartcard systems, and also provided the physical car park barrier control software.

Entry to the BCS awards is open to all comers and collaborations between multiple organisations are also welcome. Last year, the BCS UK IT Industry Awards as a whole attracted over 400 entries. Entry is via an online application process and initial judging will take place in August. Full details of how to enter are available at www.ukitindustryawards.co.uk.

Greenpeace reports the good the bad and the ugly of cloud computing data centres

Greenpeace has released a report entitled ‘How dirty is your data – A look at the energy choices that power cloud computing’.

It looks at the energy consequences of the cloud infrastructure decisions that major IT brand companies are making, assesses who’s good and who’s bad, and makes recommendations to the  IT sector on how to do things better.

Among the reports conclusions are:

• The $1bn Apple iData Center in North Carolina, expected to open shortly, will consume as much as 100 MW of electricity, but the surrounding energy grid is 95% reliant on coal and nuclear power.

• Yahoo! and Google understand the importance of a renewable energy supply. Yahoo! has sited most of its data centres near sources of renewable energy and Google is signing up to renewable energy and investing in solar and wind power projects.

• Facebook is on track to be the cloud computing company most dependent on coal-powered electricity, with the majority of its facilities estimated to rely on coal.

 

There’s lots in the report and the company rankings are interesting - Greenpeace’s reports are always provocative. My own complaint would be about the condemnation of nuclear power. It’s not good and in an ideal world we wouldn’t use it, but realistically it is going to be an essential element of the energy mix in the future. To group nuclear power with coal-fuelled generation is not helpful.

Re Google’s renewable energy investments, there have been several recent announcements:

• A $168m investment in a solar energy power plant being developed by BrightSource Energy at Ivanpah in the Mojave Desert in California.

• Google, Tyr Energy and Sumitomo Corporation of America are investing approximately $500m in a $2bn project to build the world’s largest wind farm. It’s the 845-megawatt Shepherds Flat wind project under construction near Arlington, Oregon.

• According to Reuters, Google has also invested €3.5m in a 18.7-MW German solar power plant near Berlin.

Gaia Metrics claims to cut the cost of CSR reporting by 90%

US company Gaia Metrics has launched a product which the company claims will dramatically reduce the time and cost of putting together a Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) report.

Called CSR QuickStart, the product automates the process of collecting relevant CSR data and typical cuts costs by 90% or more, the company claims.

The product uses semantic search technology to find the key words and numbers needed. It can search across company sources including public sites, intranets, SEC and census filings. In the process it highlights gaps in data and reporting that may attract the attention of regulators, media, community groups and other stakeholders. 

“Many of the world’s largest companies have made a commitment to sustainability, but just 5% of them take the next step and publish a CSR,” said Erik Thomsen, Gaia Metris co-founder and CEO.

Gaia Metrics also announced a  joint marketing relationship with CSRwire, which will market CSR QuickStart to its members. CSRwire provides corporate social responsibility and sustainability news, so the relationship will give Gaia Metrics exposure to prospective members and partners.

 

Well it sounds good and could well encourage a lot more companies to publish some form of CSR report. But I can’t help feeling that medium to large companies are likely to have (or at least need) a methodology in place for gathering information and having it easily available. CSR QuickStart may be a useful green IT tool, but periodically trawling company data doesn’t seem a great way to keep on top of CSR issues and targets.

Wysips promises self-powered mobile phones – really!

French company Wysips has created what it claims is the world’s first transparent photovoltaic film.

The concept was developed from research on lenticular images, which show different pictures depending on the observer’s position and are often used to give an illusion of depth. In a similar way Wysips technology builds solar panels into a surface without changing its appearance. Using the technology any image, or any visible surface, can become a photovoltaic source.

The film is flexible and can be made in any size, so the technology can provide a high-definition solution applicable to all types of screens. Like touch screen technology, it’s designed to become an integral part of the screen.

It can be integrated into screens, glass, fabrics, sails, plastics, and makes them all into photovoltaic energy sources. It can potentially put an electrical power sources into places and objects not previously thought possible, such as mobile phone and computer screen, clothes, books, cars, houses, etc.

 

 

In fact phones and laptops without chargers are a potential focus; “No more charges and wall sockets, your phone charges automatically on a café terrace, walking down the road, or wherever and whenever you take it”.

 

Well it sounds too good to be true. It raises two questions for me. Firstly, does it actually work? All I can say is that it won first place in CTIA's 2011 Emerging Technology Awards for Green Telecom and smart Energy Solutions, which is certainly an endorsement.

Secondly, could a mobile phone really rely on this power source alone, i.e. do away with chargers? I suspect not, unless you live in the right place with the right climate. But does that matter? It can at least top up existing charge and save a great deal of energy. According to the company; "Two billion mobile phones featuring Wysips technology... that’s one gigawatt of power produced, or the equivalent of a nuclear power plant." That’s a lot of power saved by less than half the mobile phone subscribers in the world.

The US electronics industry launches a push to increase recycling threefold

The consumer electronics industry in the US has come together with the aim of achieving a threefold increase in annual recycling. The target is to recycle one billion pounds of electronics annually by 2016, three times that in 2010. One billion pounds of electronics would otherwise fill about 88.9 million cubic feet of landfill, equivalent to an entire 71,000-seat NFL stadium (for UK/Australian readers that’s 80% of Wembley stadium or 70% of Melbourne cricket ground).

The eCycling Leadership Initiative is a collaboration among consumer electronics manufacturers, retailers, recyclers, NGOs and governments coordinated by the industry trade association, the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA). 

To achieve the aim the Initiative is looking to improve consumer awareness of the industry-sponsored collection sites, increase the amount of electronics recycled responsibly, increase the number of collection opportunities available and provide a measure of eCycling efforts. A major component will be consumer education, including new online tools and mobile apps to help make recycling used electronics as easy as buying new devices.

The Initiative is also looking at ways to continue to work with the Obama Administration’s Taskforce on Electronics Stewardship, co-chaired by the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ), Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and General Services Administration (GSA). The Task Force is developing a national strategy for responsible electronics recycling.

 

There is no national e-waste legislation in the US – just 25 states have any e-waste regulations - so this industry initiative is a step in the right direction.

The CEA also supports the movement toward third-party recycler certification and encourages more recycling in such facilities, which is to be welcomed. The US is one of the few countries that have not ratified the Basel Convention, the international agreement on trade in hazardous waste, so much e-waste sent for recycling in the US is currently exported to places where the process is more likely to be environmentally unsafe and dangerous for workers.

New cloud platforms in telematics and air travel

There have been a couple of announcements of new industry-specific cloud platforms in recent months:

•  A couple of weeks ago Microsoft and Toyota announced that they’ve come together to build a global platform to deliver Toyota’s next-generation in-car  telecommunications and information technologies using the Windows Azure platform.

The two companies will invest 1 billion yen ($12m) in Toyota Media Service Co (TMC) to develop and deploy telematics applications, starting with TMC’s electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles in 2012. TMC’s goal is to establish a global cloud platform by 2015 to provide advanced telematics services to Toyota automotive customers around the world.

TMC is already conducting trials in Japan of its Toyota Smart Center pilot program, which plans to link people, cars and homes to enable the integrated control of energy use. TMC believes that, as electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles become more popular, such systems will rely more on telematics services for achieving efficient energy management.

•  Switzerland-based air transport IT specialist, SITA, has announced that it is building an air transport industry (ATI) cloud. The company is already investing in the programme with infrastructure, platform, desktop and software-as-a-service offerings due to go live from June.

According to SITA, the air transport industry is unique in that it integrates lots of different players in the air transport eco-system, including airlines, airports and manufacturers, who all need to co-operate and share applications. They also operate within a set of national, regional and global regulations and standards, which needs a consistent approach between the stakeholders and across IT services.

The idea is to offer end-to-end air transport business and IT solutions on demand, delivered through six large regional virtual data centres across five continents, as well as virtual data centres based at large airports. The ATI Cloud will enable ATI end-users to get access to a large catalogue of applications and will provide a platform for independent software vendors (ISVs) and application service providers to distribute their solutions.

 

The Microsoft/Toyota deal is interesting because while it’s ostensibly about a telematics platform, the companies clearly see electric vehicles as becoming a central part of an energy-managed home. It’s some way in the future yet - it needs effective smart grids in place and the adoption of electric vehicles - but it seems almost inevitable.

The move makes a lot of sense for Microsoft as it gives the company another potential way in to the home energy management market, alongside its Hohm solution. And home energy management represents a huge IT opportunity.

The SITA ATI cloud has a more conventional background, bringing together a broad, but interlinked, eco-system within the air transport sector. Whilst it doesn’t have the direct green IT implications of the Microsoft/Toyota deal, such an integrated industry solution clearly has the potential to create cost and efficiency savings from economies of scale, with sustainable benefits.

It also highlights the tendency towards industry-based cloud solutions, bringing together companies up and down (and across) the supply chain.

The ITU has launched the Green ICT Application Challenge

The International Telecommunications Union (ITU) has launched a competition to find the best and most innovative idea for a climate change focused app. Called the Green ICT Application Challenge, the winning idea will win $10,000 thanks to sponsors Research in Motion (RIM – the Blackberry people) and Telefónica.

There are apps on the market that target carbon footprinting, but this competition is looking to go beyond that with apps that focus on, for example:

• Mitigation of climate change through energy efficiency in sectors such as smart buildings, intelligent transportation systems, smart homes, etc.

• Community engagement

• Eco-design

• Monitoring of climate change

• Measurement of GHG emissions

• Adaptation to climate change (e.g. use of applications for emergency telecommunications and alerting systems for disaster relief)

Contestants will need to submit a detailed concept with an explanation of how the idea helps combat climate change and provides an ICT solution to environmental or sustainability issues. It can be for the web, a personal computer or a mobile device.

The winner will also be invited to present their concept at the ITU’s Green Standards Week in Rome in September, and it may also be developed and showcased at the COP-17 climate change talks in South Africa in December.

Dr Hamadoun Touré, ITU Secretary General said, “We have seen how ubiquitous apps have become and how useful they can be. The Green ICT Application Challenge is our way of spurring a next wave of innovation tackling real world problems. We are excited to see what developers will create to influence this truly global problem.”

 

Well I’ve reported on a few possible contenders in the last couple of years, so maybe some of those will make the competition. If you know of any good examples pass the information on. The closing date for entries is 17 June, 2011 and more details are here.

1E launches a product to identify software waste

1E, probably best known for its NightWatchman power management products, has today launched a solution aimed at eliminating software waste.  Called AppClarity, the software identifies, financially quantifies and eliminates software that’s not being used.

The idea is to ensure that organisations only use – and pay for – the software and licenses they need. AppClarity identifies all software sitting unused on PCs, assigns a cost to wasted software, gives users the ability to make the final decision on whether they really want the software or not, and provides an in-depth analysis of software usage showing where cost efficiencies can be made.

In support of the launch 1E also released some research that showed that over 80% of IT managers in the US and UK have more than $100 of unused software on each of their PCs. That makes a total of $15bn of preventable software costs in organisations in the two countries.

The study found that just 8% of UK and 9% of US organisations systematically reclaim unused software licenses to save money, citing concerns about user reaction, business risk and lack of tools as reasons against action. This is the market that AppClarity is aimed at; “Despite clear benefits and the staggering costs associated with unused software and shelf ware, organisations do not routinely reclaim software licenses,” commented Sumir Karayi, CEO, 1E.

 

OK, so this is not primarily a green IT product. Clearly there will be some environmental savings in not distributing and maintaining software that’s not being used, but it’s not much. However, this is the market where many green IT products play, i.e. it’s aimed at greater efficiency and less waste in general, which has the side effect of reducing emissions and being more environmentally friendly.

For example, while 1E’s PC power management software is clearly aimed at reducing the power used by PCs by actually turning them off when no one is using them, the server version uses the more roundabout route of identifying machines that are not running any productive applications, which can then be taken out of service. (It’s a more acceptable method for data centre managers who often don’t want software to control the power going to servers).

Anyway, this broader ‘efficiency’ market includes many green IT products and services that benefit from the label. But not (entirely) green IT as we know it, Jim ….

UK consultancy WSP acquires Swedish environmental software company

UK-based design engineering and management consultancy WSP, has acquired Swedish environmental software company, Natlikan.

WSP is an international company active in a number of sectors, including property, transport & infrastructure, industry and environment projects.  It’s one of the largest international consultancy groups in the world employing around 9,000 staff worldwide.

Natlikan designs and builds web-based environmental solutions integrated with environmental consultancy. Solutions include access to easily searchable compliance and legislative documents and a web-based Corporate Sustainability Reporting tool. The company also manages ‘Green Chain’, a membership based sustainable supply chain management network. Clients include: Bombardier; Rolls Royce; Volvo; Alfa Laval; Danske Bank; and ABB. Natlikan will become part of WSP Digital, the company’s global environmental technology and software business.

Henry Okraglik, Global Director of WSP Digital says that the acquisition of Natlikan is a perfect complement to WSP’s expanding range of online expertise: “We are increasingly using web based technologies to enable our clients to access information, knowledge and take control of their environmental, sustainability and risk management issues. Natlikan’s long and successful track record in procuring, mediating and publishing online legal environmental information is a natural extension to the capability we can offer clients.”

 

There will be more of these sorts of acquisitions in the future. There is a clear synergy between consulting companies and environmental software providers. Much consultancy work can be mundane and really needs to be automated. That’s particularly true for aspects of carbon emissions assessment and CSR reporting, for example - using tools speeds up engagements and reduces costs. On the other hand, many companies, particularly complex international organisations, are reluctant to rely solely on software solutions without some consultancy back-up. So a coming together in some form or another benefits both parties.

ADEME is developing an IT carbon footprint calculator for France

A month ago I relayed the news that The Carbon Trust, the WRI and WBCSD - the two organisations behind the Greenhouse Protocol Initiative - and the Global e-Sustainability Initiative (GeSI) are developing new guidance on how ICT companies and customers should calculate the carbon footprint of ICT products and services.

Well it seems they’re not the only ones. GreenIT.fr reports that ADEME, the French Environment and Energy Management Agency, is also addressing the question. ADEME is preparing a greenhouse gas emissions assessment tool for the IT sector using its Bilan Carbone methodology.

GreenIT.fr and Zen’To, a French green ICT consultancy (founded by ex-BT managers) will be helping to develop the guidance and the methodology and emission factors will be available at the end of the year.

 

The difference between ADEME and the Greenhouse Gas Protocol Initiative group is that ADEME is an (independent) government institution whilst the GHG Protocol group is made up of IT industry representatives, environmental consultancies and an NGO. 

It’s likely that the two approaches will come up with similar methodologies. Let’s hope so, since the more ways there are to measure emissions the more confusing it is for potential users and the more difficult it is to compare measurements between companies, which must be one of the main objectives.

Hopefully the outcomes will be similar enough for the organisations to eventually agree a common standard. They do have the same goal after all.

Facebook shares its green IT technology, but is it enough?

Facebook has launched what it calls the Open Compute Project, which aims to improve the energy efficiency of data centres.

The idea is to share the technology used in its first dedicated data centre in Prineville, Oregon, which delivered a 38% increase in energy efficiency at 24% lower cost. The technology enabled the data centre to achieve an initial Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) ratio of 1.07, compared with 1.5 for existing facilities, which itself fall into the EPA’s "best practice" category.

The specifications and best practices of the new data centre will now be available to companies across the industry. Facebook is publishing the specifications and mechanical designs for Open Compute Project hardware, including motherboards, power supply, server chassis, and server and battery cabinets. In addition, the company is making available its data centre electrical and mechanical construction specifications.

Facebook is releasing these designs to encourage industry-wide collaboration around best practices for data centre and server technology. AMD, Dell, HP and Intel are among the companies that co-developed technology and Dell's Data Centre Solutions business will design and build servers based on the Open Compute Project specification.

As well as the energy and cost savings, the designs also save material. The servers are free of all non-essential parts, which saves more than six pounds of materials per server. In a typical data centre this would save more than 120 tons of material from being manufactured, transported, and, eventually, discarded.

It all sounds like good news, but, as we reported back in February, Greenpeace thinks the company should go further by using more renewable energy. In the run up to Earth Day (April 22^nd) the environmental NGO wants Facebook to ‘unfriend’ coal. Specifically:

• Increase Facebook’s use of clean energy;

• Develop a plan to mitigate the company’s climate footprint and to become coal free by 2021;

• Educate Facebook users about how the company powers its services;

• Advocate for clean energy at a local, national and international level.

 

I agree with Greenpeace. Facebook should be commended for the Open Compute Project, but this is a company with a pre-eminent position in the industry. In the UK alone the company has 30 million users, three quarters of all internet accounts. That’s an incredible position of influence and with it comes responsibility.

Facebook needs to do more if it wants to be seen as truly supporting green IT.  Simply passing on its technology insights is a relatively small action given the scale of the problem. As Greenpeace points out, Facebook has a real opportunity to lead by example in its environmental actions and can show that businesses can flourish using clean energy.

Fujitsu has published an international report on green IT in financial services - the UK comes out on top

Last Week Fujitsu published a report looking at Green IT in the financial services sector. The paper compares the Green IT
maturity of banking, finance and insurance organisations in four countries, the US, UK, Australia and India, based on information from more than 630 CIOs and senior IT managers across industry sectors.

The research uses the Green IT maturity methodology from Connection Research/RMIT University to quantify five aspects of Green IT implementation:

• Lifecycle (procurement and disposal)

• End user IT efficiencies

• Enterprise and data centre IT efficiencies

• Use of IT as a low-carbon enabler

• Measurement and monitoring

The full report can be downloaded here, but the UK financial services sector ranked highest of the countries with a score of 63.8 (out of 100), followed by the US at 60.3, Australia (53.9) and India (51.1). Compared with other industries, financial services scored just above the average; 57.3 against the top rated ICT sector at 62.6 (IT/Comms/Media).

The highest scoring aspect of Green IT varied between countries. End-user computing was in top spot in the UK and Australia, lifecycle in the US, and enterprise computing in India, but for all four countries ‘measurement and monitoring’ scored lowest

The UK’s lead was attributed to a combination of the sophistication of the sector’s IT systems and the country’s environmental legislation. The particularly high score of 69.3 for the end user aspect was credited to companies moving beyond the quick wins to longer term actions.

 

The finance sector is a heavy user of IT because technology is so central to its operations, consequently the consumption of energy by IT is greater than in other industries. From what I’ve seen the industry has been a relatively early adopter of some aspects of green IT (for instance in the end user aspects, which explains the lead) but the focus is on where most money can be saved with least effort.

That attitude might explain why measuring emissions has been less well addressed – this is not so much a planned and targeted sustainability approach but a cost cutting exercise. But it doesn’t really explain why more has not been done in enterprise computing. The banks have a huge opportunity to save energy and emissions in data centres and via the cloud.

Dell pilots mushroom packaging

The Direct2Dell blog has let it be known that Dell is launching a pilot to test the use of mushroom-based packaging.

The blog describes it as advanced biotechnology, and it’s sponsored by the US National Science Foundation, the EPA, and the USDA (United States Department of Agriculture). It’s a way to use agricultural waste products to replace styrofoam and polyethylene in packaging materials and it has apparently passed lab tests with flying colours.

Basically the mushroom cushioning is grown by inoculating waste product like cotton hulls with mushroom spawn. Using the carbohydrates and sugars in the agricultural waste, the cushions take 5 - 10 days to grow. Because they’re organic, they can even be composted after use.

The initial pilot shipments will be for the PowerEdge R710 server multipack, which already saves materials by fitting four systems in one box.

 

You may think it’s all a bit gimmicky, but it’s part of a long-term sustainable packaging strategy that Dell initially announced back in December 2008.  Mushrooms are not the only organic material that has been used, either. The company is already using bamboo packaging for notebooks and smartphones and half the Inspiron line of consumer laptops is shipped in bamboo-based packaging. The mushroom cushions are better suited to heavier products like servers and desktops.

Dell’s sustainable packaging strategy aims to eliminate 20 million pounds of computer packaging by the end of 2012, which when it was announced represented a saving of $8m as well as helping preserve more than 150,000 trees.  The plan includes reducing desktop and laptop packaging materials by 10% worldwide, increasing sustainable content in cushioning and corrugated packaging by 40% and ensuring that 75% of packaging is recyclable through curbside collections by 2012.

It’ll be interesting to see if they make the targets – I’ll keep you posted - but the company certainly seems to be serious in the attempt. Just the endeavour will be enough to tick some boxes for customers struggling with their own green ICT strategies.

Greenstone adds ICT footprinting to its carbon management software

Greenstone Carbon Management, the UK-based carbon management solution company, has enhanced the latest version of its software to include carbon emissions analysis from IT equipment.

Version 2.5 of its Acco₂unt, Greenstone’s  carbon management software, includes new functionality to enable organisations to measure ICT energy consumption and carbon emissions across organisations. The ICT footprinting capability covers servers, desktops, laptops, printers, monitors, networks, telephony, imaging and audio visual devices.  Energy consumption is calculated using a combination of power rating and live, standby and sleep time from each equipment type.

Matthew de Villiers, CEO at Greenstone said, “We recognise that monitoring energy consumption and carbon emissions from an ICT estate is becoming an important area of focus for our clients who are looking to target their reduction investment in specific business activities.  We are also developing propositions with our partners who operate in the ICT space to help them demonstrate carbon, consumption and cost reduction opportunities to their clients through the implementation of their ICT solutions.”

 

It’s no surprise that carbon management solutions have started to focus on specific business aspects, particularly the ICT area, which can be the most significant energy user in many services companies.

ICT is also the obvious sector to deal with first because its the sector that carbon solutions providers know about. Expect to see other industries and business aspects receive similar focus in the future.

It also brings home the on-going need for specialist carbon management solutions. This is not a one-size-fits-all market and specialist suppliers will fill the niches. It will be hard for broad-based services and management consulting companies to meet all their clients’ requirements without calling on specialists.

SAIC sells oil and gas IT services business to focus on smart grids

US scientific, engineering and technology company SAIC (Science Applications International Corporation) has announced that it is selling its oil and gas IT services business to Wipro. SAIC's Global Oil and Gas Information Technology practice provides consulting, system integration and outsourcing services to global oil companies.

The sale includes the US oil and gas IT services business along with operations in the UK, France, India and the Middle East, which all mainly focus on the oil and gas market. Around 1,450 employees are expected to move to Wipro.

What makes the announcement interesting is the fact that the main reason for the sale is a future focus on sustainable aspects of the energy market. "The sale of these operations will enable SAIC to better focus on our strategic growth areas, including market segments in the energy sector, such as smart grid, renewable energy implementation, and energy efficiency, where we have successfully built our business through organic growth and acquisitions," said Walt Havenstein, SAIC CEO.

 

The SAIC business apparently makes a profit, but SAIC clearly sees much more growth potential in renewables than the oil and gas sector. It’s no surprise, given the huge opportunities and the fact that most IT services companies are actively positioning themselves for a slice of the action.

The purchase will boost Wipro’s non-India businesses and give it broader industry focus, but the $150m the company paid is for a bigger slice in what is already a mature market. 

UK company Onzo’s Smart Energy Kit is the choice for Amsterdam’s Sustainable Neighbourhood project

UK-based Onzo’s Smart Energy Kit has been chosen as the only energy display to be rolled out to households in Amsterdam. Under the Sustainable Neighbourhood project, 500 homes in the North West district of the Dutch capital have been equipped with Echelon’s smart meters. Of these, 50 have also been given Onzo’s Smart Energy Kit as part of a six month trial to find out how much energy home owners can save when given easy-to-understand information about their electricity consumption.

 

Onzo launched the Smart Energy Kit in the UK in 2010. It comprises a sensor, in-home display and personalised website. For the Amsterdam Project, Onzo is using a low-cost sensor that connects with the Echelon smart meters given to residents. Information about a household’s electricity usage appears in the display in real time and the data can be uploaded to the website where consumers can receive energy saving tips and track their energy usage.

There has also been an online campaign (of which the video below is a part) to raise awareness of the Smart Energy Kit and there will be neighbourhood days out to give participants tips on energy saving. 

 

 

Students of the University of Amsterdam will be testing the effectiveness of the smart meter and Smart Energy Kit in reducing energy usage, but apparently initial feedback has been positive, with a call for an increase in energy saving targets to make the experience more challenging.

The Sustainable Neighbourhood project is one of several projects in the Amsterdam Smart City initiative, launched in 2009. It brings together government, businesses and residents to develop and test smart projects that will save energy in the future.

What I like about Onzo’s solution is that the product is attractive and the company seems to be very consumer focused.  It talks about providing a ‘comprehensive and engaging set of customer touch points’ for example.

It’s certainly what’s needed. If smart meters and smart grids are going to fulfil their potential, and arguably there’s an awful lot depending on them doing so, then consumers need to be on side. Providing a display is not enough – the device has to be attractive, its use engaging and all backed up by plenty of support to help consumers reap the benefits that smart grids will (eventually) bring.

Hopefully we will see similar devices in the UK. Only last week the government set out its final plan for the installation of 53 million smart meters in 30 million homes. It’s much as previously expected, although suggestions that the process may be speeded up have not proved accurate. There will be a five-year rollout starting in 2014.

New Zealand sets a GHG reduction target, while the UK fails to make any progress towards theirs

The New Zealand government has set a target of a 50% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, compared with 1990, by 2050. It’s been a government proposal for a while, but feedback from a recent public consultation has been positive, so the target has been officially adopted.

It’s not as ambitious as the UK target of 80% reduction by 2050, but then the UK seems to be struggling. The Department of Energy and Climate Change last week released the provisional figures for 2010 greenhouse gas emissions. It’s not great reading:

• In 2010, UK emissions of the six greenhouse gases covered by the Kyoto Protocol were estimated to be 582.4 million tonnes CO2e - 2.8% higher than in 2009. Net emissions of CO2 alone were 491.7 million tonnes, up 3.8%.

• Between 2009 and 2010, there were increases in CO2 emissions from most of the main sectors. Emissions were up 13.4% from the residential sector, 3.3% from the energy supply sector and 2.4% from the business sector. Transport was down by just 0.1%. (Note that these figures are based on the source of the emissions, rather than end-user activity, so the emissions from electricity generation are attributed to power stations, rather than where it was used).

• The increase in CO2 emissions resulted primarily from a rise in residential gas use, combined with fuel switching away from nuclear power to coal and gas for electricity generation.

The UK government lays out its ICT strategy – where’s green IT?

On Wednesday the UK coalition government announced its ICT strategy. It falls into four areas:

• Reducing waste and project failure and stimulating economic growth

• Creating a common ICT infrastructure

• Using ICT to enable and deliver change

• Strengthening governance

A lot of the content has been referred to before, but there are 30 specific action plans with delivery timescales of either less than six months, within 6-12 months or within 12-24 months. Given the lack of detail of how the plans are going to be achieved, it reads as much as a wish list as a strategy.

Reflecting the government’s overall focus, of the 30 actions detailed, 14 are in the ‘reducing waste/product failure’ section, 11 in the ‘creating a common ICT infrastructure’ and just 5 in the ‘Using ICT to enable and deliver change’ category

In the governance section there’s a diagram of a new governance structure, but to the untrained eye it’s not clear exactly what’s new here.

 

 

When it comes to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, the main action is that the Government will to publish a separate Greening Government ICT strategy within six months. This will set out how it will achieve reductions in operational costs and carbon footprints and will include the use of collaboration and mobile working technologies.

The other action to address the carbon footprint of government ICT is the setting up of a programme to reduce the cost of data centres across the estate, leading to a 35% reduction in costs over five years. The programme will be set up in the next six months.

 

Well we will have to see the detail when it comes in the green ICT strategy, but so far it’s not looking good.

The UK is legally committed to significant reductions in carbon emissions, so the UK government not only needs to lead by example, but also needs to be clear about the objectives. Even when emissions reductions are mentioned in this document they are quickly subsumed within a cost-saving umbrella. The UK government has a duty to reduce emissions and should make this an end in itself.

The other main omission is that although there is a reference to green ICT helping reduce travel costs (through mobile flexibility) there is no overall recognition of how ICT can help reduce emissions in the public sector as a whole. Unfortunately, since ‘Using ICT to enable and deliver change’ is the area that gets gets least focus, ICT as a green enabler gets lost altogether.