The ICT industry needs a common standard for reporting power use - BCS

The UK’s BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT, has put out a press release today calling for a common standard for reporting ICT power use. The organisation believes that just detailing the energy costs of a data centre does not provide enough transparency.

The BCS maintains that any assessment should highlight the energy source, i.e. the proportion generated from renewable power or from more ‘dirty’ emission intensive sources. If there was a common standard that included the energy source it would provide a more complete and consistent picture in footprint calculations and reduction actions, so that users could judge whether the cloud services they are using really are green and sustainable.

BCS cites research from Greenpeace (which I mentioned in April).  The NGO published a report, called ‘How dirty is your data – A look at the energy choices that power cloud computing’, which looks at the energy consequences of the cloud infrastructure decisions that major IT companies are making and assesses who’s good and who’s bad. It also recommends that the  IT sector should focus more on clean energy, be more transparent in reporting the power mix and actively seek locations where clean power is available to site new data centres.

The BCS points out that there are already tools and programs in place to measure data centre efficiency, including its own Certified Energy Efficiency Data Centre Award (CEEDA), the Green Grid’s Maturity Model and the EU Code of Conduct for Data Centres. The organisation is also supporting the Carbon Trust/ WRI/GeSI project to develop foot-printing methods specifically for ICT. The aim is that it will become an ICT Sector Supplement to the Greenhouse Gas Protocol Product Accounting and Reporting Standard. The BCS wants to expand the terms of reference of the group to include common standards to derive the power/CO2 emission factors that underpin footprint calculations. 

 

A commendable thought from the BCS, and one that has already been suggested by the Open Data Center Alliance (ODCA). The OCDA has come up with a measure for the carbon footprint expressed as:

The measure takes into consideration the carbon emissions from sources, which will depend on the power being used – zero if it is a completely renewable source.  It also borrows from existing assessments, in that the ‘energy overhead’ is effectively the PUE, as defined by the Green Grid.

It seems to me that the ODCA’s approach is right. Any assessment of data centre energy use must (transparently) show the total energy, energy efficiency and an actual emissions if it is going to be both meaningful and useful. What bothers me is that so many organisations are involved in various attempts to achieve it.

But the GHG Protocol Initiative is pretty much the de-facto standards body in this respect, so I support the BCS’ move to expand the terms of reference of their ICT assessment. Having spoken to the ODCA recently I know the organisation is happy to support others in working out the details of ICT foot printing.

Energy management research centre announced in Australia

Swinburne University of Technology in Australia has partnered with GreenWave Reality, a home energy management solution provider, to open an Energy Management Research Centre (EMRC). The idea is that the centre, based at the university’s Hawthorn campus in Melbourne, will serve as an international hub for thought leadership, excellence and experience in intelligent home energy conservation solutions.

The EMRC will including a research and development centre, a demonstration and training facility, and seminar and conference hall. The showpiece will be an Energy Efficiency demonstration room with a 50” 3D display used to demonstrate the real-time impact of energy conservation measures and technologies. It will also have a training room with the GreenWave Reality Home Energy Management platform running on a range of Internet-enabled devices such as smart phones, tablets and PCs.

Swinburne University has a strong technological base and links with industry, as well as research centres and international partnerships. GreenWave Reality provides solutions that make it easier for consumers to understand their energy consumption as well as providing utilities with the tools to better appreciate energy usage patterns so that they can balance distribution on the grid.

The centre is expected to serve as a hub for international collaboration, so that scientists and technologists can explore additional energy saving measures.

Australia’s Product Stewardship Bill heralds new e-waste regulations

The Australian Parliament has passed the Product Stewardship Bill, the legislation that provides the framework to effectively manage the environmental, health and safety impacts of products, and in particular the impacts associated with disposal. The first scheme to be established under the legislation will be to collect and recycle televisions and computers at the end of their product life. The scheme is expected to be phased in from the end of 2011.

Product stewardship is based on the principle of shared public and private responsibility for reducing the environmental impact of manufactured goods. The passage of the Bill completes a commitment by the Australian Government under the National Waste Policy which was agreed in November 2009. Both the Australian Information Industry Association (AIIA) and Product Stewardship Australia (PSA), the environmental body representing TV manufacturers, have welcomed the Bill.

The National Television and Computer Product Stewardship Scheme will be the first one off the blocks and the basis for most e-waste management in Australia. Under the proposals importers or manufacturers will be required to help fund a product stewardship organisation (PSO) to organise the collection and recycling of televisions and computers, or implement at least as good a scheme themselves. All users need to do is ensure that their old televisions and computers are left at a designated collection point. Regulations to underpin this scheme are expected to be finalised in the second half of 2011.

 

A number of major IT manufacturers already have their own product take-back schemes in place in Australia, so the national program should have limited impact on their costs, and hence product prices. But the volume implications of the scheme will certainly be an incentive for manufacturers to make product recycling more efficient by using more environmentally-friendly materials, better design for recycling and more efficient recycling processes to reclaim materials.

New UK organisation champions smart grids – SmartGrid GB

A new cross industry body was launched last Thursday to champion the development and delivery of smart grids in Great Britain. SmartGrid GB is the idea of Intellect, the UK ICT trade association, together with key stakeholders from the utilities industry, but will also include NGOs, government, regulators and consumer groups.

The aim is to promote the consumer, environmental and economic benefits of smart grid infrastructure. The group will provide government with policy advice and direction on what actions are required and how smart grid can be delivered.

Gavin Jones of IBM and acting Chair of SmartGrid GB said “Britain can’t afford to fall behind its competitors. SmartGrid GB will set out an ambitious and challenging vision and develop a plan of how we get there. It will bring together the best minds and best ideas and provide a step-change in our engagement with government. This really is a call to arms.”

Founding members of the group are: Accenture, Alcatel-Lucent, Astrium, British Gas, Cable & Wireless, Consumer Focus, EDF Energy, Gemserv, General Electric, IBM, Intellect, Logica, McAfee, RWE npower, Power Plus Communications, SAP, Siemens, SP Energy Networks, UK Power Networks, and Utiligroup. DECC (Department of Energy and Climate Change) and Ofgem (the UK energy regulator) will be observer members and companies from across the utility and technology sectors, academic organisations and consumer bodies are all being invited to join.

SmartGrid GB will also be the newest member of the Global Smart Grid Federation - a network of similar organisations from the USA, Japan, India, Ireland, South Korea, Australia and Canada that share ideas and best practice.

 

This is a good move by Intellect to keep the smart grid/smart meter momentum moving and I like the ‘step-change in our engagement with government’ comment.

Smart grids and meters are the basic infrastructure that will have huge implications for the country as a whole, both in terms of energy provision, particularly renewable energy, and how consumers use resources. Decisions made now may well determine the uptake of electric vehicles and influence how we consume energy in our homes.

Most of it relies on ICT, so the government needs as much support (not to say pressure) to get it right. In the current economic climate we can’t rely on government to make the best long-term decisions, particularly where ICT investment is concerned (and green ICT at that).

Google ‘retires’ PowerMeter

In a surprise move Google has announced that it is going to ‘retire’ Google PowerMeter, its home electricity monitoring tool, on September16th this year because it “didn’t catch on the way we would have hoped”.

PowerMeter was designed to show consumers their home energy information, almost in real time, on their computer. The idea was that the application would help consumers better manage their electricity use, particularly since research showed that access to energy information results in savings of 5-15% in electricity usage.

However, according to a blog from Bill Weihl, Google’s Green Energy Czar, PowerMeter “didn't scale as we had hoped”, but the company believes the product did highlight the importance of access to information in areas where it’s traditionally been difficult.

Google points out that since the launch of PowerMeter more attention has been given to the notion of people easily accessing their energy data and the installation of smart meters and other home energy devices is picking up steam. Particularly since the White House announced a goal of giving all consumers access to their energy usage in computer-friendly formats as part of a national plan for modernising the electricity grid.

“It’s exciting to see others drive innovation and pursue opportunities in this important new market. We’re proud of what we’ve accomplished with PowerMeter and look forward to what will develop next in this space”.

 

PowerMeter has been around since February 2009 and in June 2010 CNET reported that Google was looking to expand the product into other areas such as natural gas and other utilities in the home. At the time, Dan Reicher, director of climate change initiatives at Google, also said that Google was working on "demand dispatch", which is the way that software and the Internet can be used to act as a go-between for home users and the grid to keep a balance of supply and demand.

It does look like the market has overtaken Google on this one. In early 2009 giving users clear information on their electricity usage might have seemed innovative, but it has become generally accepted as part of the smart grid/smart meter implementation. Google’s particular strength is in online apps, whereas a wide range of communication and information technologies is being brought to bear in this area, often from dedicated specialist companies. It seems to have made the market less attractive to Google.

But it’s also increasingly tied up with a broader Home Energy Management (HEM) and Home Area Networks (HAN) market, which, potentially, could have a huge impact on home ICT users. I would be very surprised if Google doesn’t want to get involved in this area of green IT somewhere, which would explain the ‘what will develop next in this space’ comment.

Enablon receives $15m funding for international expansion

Sustainability management software company Enablon has received $15m investment from the Environmental Technologies Fund (ETF) to support further R&D and expansion in Europe, North America and Asia.

Enablon, probably best known for its carbon accounting software, now supplies a range of solutions to help companies become more sustainable, including corporate responsibility, sustainable supply chain, energy efficiency and carbon management, risk management, and corporate governance. The company, which was founded in Paris in 2000, says that its solutions are now used by more than 250 companies around the world with 200,000 users.

ETF, which is providing the new investment backed by institutional investors, specialises in providing funding to growth companies with worldwide ambitions that are making an environmental impact.

 

Enablon has already made a name for itself as an energy/carbon accounting software provider. Last year Groom Energy Research released a report into the Enterprise Carbon Accounting (ECA) software market in which Enablon was named as one of eight 2010 ECA Emerging Leaders, based on number of customer deployments, technology features, market vision and financial stability.

The company now claims to provide the industry’s most comprehensive suite of software, content and technology to manage sustainability performance. Maybe so, but there is intense competition across this sector of the green ICT market and in the short term its not clear whether an all-encompassing sustainability solution company will win out against those with a narrower specialist focus.

But it does mean Enablon has a head start. In the longer term we will also see increasing partnerships and, eventually, consolidation into a few major players with similar broad offerings.

Samsung launches solar-powered laptop

Samsung is about to launch a solar-powered 10.1in netbook in Russia. The NC215S laptop comes with solar panels built into the lid which means the battery lasts for up to 14.5 hours. According to Samsung’s Russian web site two hours of charging the device in the sun provides one additional hour of battery life.

With ‘Sleep-and-Charge’ USB port the netbook can also charge portable devices such as smartphones or MP3-players even if it’s in sleep mode or turned off. Even if the battery is flat it can still charge devices using the solar charging.

As well as being solar powered, the NC215S has a TCO certificate for ergonomic design and environmental protection. According to the company it is a low-power device and is made of materials that are easily recyclable.

The netbook will be launched in Russia in August but there is also press and blog speculation about availability in African markets and in the US. The retail price is expected to be 13,999 Roubles. (That translates to £310 or $500, but no other prices have been announced).

 

I’ve reported on other devices that could be solar-charged, but I don’t recall another netbook that had integrated solar panels. If I didn’t already have a Samsung netbook, with which I am very happy, I would be tempted. Certainly as and when I need a replacement (which is not likely to be anytime soon, unfortunately) the solar version device is tempting.

The idea of just leaving it in the sun for a while to extend battery life is very appealing. And the ability to charge other devices even when it’s own battery is flat is a nice touch. A good example of how green IT can be. Hopefully other manufacturers will follow, although it may only really be effective for netbooks (and tablets) rather than larger devices.

It’ll be interesting to see if it’s more expensive than standard versions, but if the Russian price is indicative then I suspect not – or not much anyway.

Viridity Software tracks application power use

The latest version of Viridity Software’s data centre infrastructure management (DCIM) software will be able to assess the power used by specific applications and business processes.

Viridity’s EnergyCenter solution provides an analysis of data centre energy use based on the utilisation and power consumption of servers. It does it by identifying equipment, recording utilisation (based on processor activity) and then using reference tables of server power to assess actual energy use. The information serves as a reference point for data centre managers looking to save cost and space.

The new Version 2.0, due out in July, adds the ability to group or filter data centre assets based on application or owner. It means that physical and virtual servers can be associated with applications and lines-of-business, with energy consumption based on a database of thousands of server and application configurations. The new version can also reveal virtual machine sprawl and identify underutilised servers.

 

Data centre infrastructure and energy management solutions are getting more sophisticated all the time and Viridity is no exception. What’s different about Viridity’s solution is that it doesn’t need any additional hardware or software installed – it just identifies the hardware and application and checks its database for energy use. It means it’s fast to implement and relatively inexpensive, which is partly why the company is focusing on medium-sized organizations as its target market.

I guess the question is how accurate the solution is, i.e. what proportion of hardware and applications are identified in the database? No doubt it’s quite high and good enough for the requirements of mid-sized companies. But larger data centre managers may prefer actual measurement of energy use via sensors.

Clearly the company is doing something right. It raised another $8m from existing investors last September and earlier this year won the Uptime Institute’s 2011 Green Enterprise IT Awards (GEIT) in the ‘Outstanding IT Product In a User Deployment’ category. 

Logica extends its sustainability strategy

I received an update on Logic’s sustainability offerings last week from Tony Rooke, the UK Sustainability Practice Leader. (It would have been face-to-face, but for signal failure at Watford). In a nutshell, the company is expanding its sustainability strategy, which now falls within the consulting arm, and has launched practices across country operations looking to drive repeatable business.

Up until recently Logica focussed on three areas of sustainability – carbon reduction, sustainable energy and sustainable mobility. That has now been expanded to encompass smart utilities and sustainable supply chain.

 

 

The focus is very much on aligning the sustainable propositions with client strategies, i.e. integrating sustainability with the business case. The cross-vertical country practices will take the lead role in developing propositions and leveraging other aspects of the business to deliver them.

There is also a new Head of Global Sustainability, Business Consulting Practice - Melba Foggo – who comes highly recommended from a role as Global Director at Ernst & Young’s Climate Change and Sustainability Services practice

 

It’s a broader strategy than the last time I spoke with Logica but it does seem to be built on real customer experiences which are being transformed into repeatable solutions. It comes across as a coming together of capabilities, rather than a wish list of market opportunities, which has been the case with some companies.

The challenge will be to maximise the business benefits across country operations. Sustainability progresses at different rates in different sectors and countries based on a lot of external circumstances, such as legislation, infrastructure projects, etc. There is a need for close international liaison with a good overview to leverage experience and maximise opportunities.

Also, Logica still has its reputation for technological capability, so I have slight reservations about the whole sustainability operation being labelled as ‘consulting’, for fear it suffers from association with other less hands-on approaches, but I see the logic of the positioning.

The Open Data Center Alliance releases a carbon footprint usage model

The Open Data Center Alliance (ODCA) is the organisation launched back in October with the objective of defining usage models that will help IT users choose open, interoperable, industry-standard solutions in their data centres. It has expanded significantly since it was set up and now has 280 member companies.

Anyway, it has now come up with the first eight of its usage models, which fall within four areas:

• Secure Federation
  • Security Monitoring
  • Security Provider Assurance
• Automation
  • IO Control
  • VM Interoperability
• Common Management and Policy
  • Regulatory Framework
• Transparency
  • Carbon Footprint
  • Service Catalogue
  • Standard Units of Measurement for IaaS

These eight are seen as the highest priority for action and each has a number of steering group committees behind them. They are looking for feedback on the published models prior to a review, but the original idea is that vendors should create a road map to comply with the usage model within six months and have auditable compliance within 18 months.

In the case of the carbon footprint model this is top level stuff aimed at creating consistency in carbon reporting. It simply requires that vendors make carbon footprint data available through price lists so that comparisons of carbon emissions can be made by potential customers, and also that the actual emissions are summarised in customers’ monthly bills. Even then, it is not expected to be 100% accurate.

The usage model documentation points out that there are lots of reasons why the footprint will vary between suppliers, depending on hardware and software used, degree of virtualisation, efficiency of the facility, local climate, etc. But it also makes it clear that the model, as it stands at the moment, does not prescribe how any of these factors can be improved, deferring to the many existing sources of such information, including the EU Code of Conduct for Data Centres.

When it comes to defining what it actually means by carbon footprint, the model takes into consideration both energy efficiency and the emissions from the source of power. So if a data centre uses only green power (zero emissions) then it will have a zero carbon footprint however efficient or inefficient it is. The actual formula for calculation is:

Note that the ‘energy overhead’ is effectively the PUE, as defined by the Green Grid.

 

Well it immediately raises a number of questions and I had the chance to talk with a couple of representatives from ODCA council companies last week to clarify.

It’s clear that this is a tentative first step into the minefield of carbon counting by the Alliance. It may help data centre service customers in their in-house carbon reporting, but as it stands it needs a more detailed methodology to make it effective as a comparison tool between vendors.

For instance, there is no indication how service providers should allocate the power use in a data centre between clients or how to measure dedicated data centres compared with mixed use facilities. These are issues that the Green Grid and other organisations are already grappling with and the ODCA is happy to leave them to get on with it. They’re not about to re-invent the wheel, but want to collaborate with the organisations already involved. 

So all in all this is quite a narrow requirement on vendors. As yet it’s not detailed enough to provide accurate comparisons between vendors, stand up to the increasingly detailed scrutiny of carbon reporting or enable a real comparison between service provision and an in-house solution, for example.

But this is a powerful organisation and a force for good. As long as the ODCA doesn’t actually muddy the waters through its carbon footprint usage model it should at least push the market in the right direction. In any case, ultimately the sustainability of the data centre will become much more of an issue in its own right and companies will themselves push for more information.

Kiwibank saves NZ$24,570 a year turning off PCs with 1E’s software

1E has published a case study detailing the savings expected to be made by a New Zealand bank by shutting down computers using 1E’s software. Kiwibank will save up to NZ$24,570 in energy costs, reduce energy use by 163,800 kWh and reduce CO2 emissions by 32 tonnes in the first year.

Kiwibank has over 900 staff (nearly all with a PC), 700,000 customers and branches located within more than 300 PostShops throughout the country. Energy meters were showing that over half of computers were being left on at night and over weekends and the company was looking to reap the financial and sustainability benefits of computer power management.

The bank wanted to centrally control and report on
the power consumption of computers across it’s entire
IT estate and also to set specific power policies for different areas of the business:

• Turn off at 7pm and on again at 7am for office-based staff

• Turn off at 10pm and on again at 6:30am for computers in the call centre

• A small group of business-critical computers needed to be left to run 24/7/365 with no power policy set

Initially 1E’s NightWatchman and WakeUp products were installed across a representative sample of computers and data was collected over four weeks to benchmark PC energy consumption. NightWatchman showed that during this period 52% of computers were left on overnight. Over the weekends 50% of computers were left on – with only 9% being used.

 

Kiwibank received funding for the project through New Zealand’s Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority (EECA). The technology grant required third-party verification of the projected energy, cost and CO2
emissions savings and it’s that independent verification that confirmed that, at an average of 15 cents per kWh, Kiwibank would be saving approximately NZ$27.32 per computer per year.

 

It’s a nice case study which pretty much confirms how quick and easy it is to make savings using PC power management.

In fact the surprise for me is that Kiwibank, a company described as having sustainability at its heart and which was recognised as the Emerging Large and Corporate Business in the 2009 NZI Sustainable Business Awards, hadn’t done it before. The per computer savings suggest that the bank would have made a return on investment within about six months, which makes it worthwhile with or without a grant.

On the other hand, the company is not alone. Last year the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was working on the assumption that in a commercial environment only 36% of PCs are turned off at night and weekends. And in its 2010 Progress Report the Climate Savers Computing Initiative (CSCI) estimated the adoption of its recommended power management features (hard drives turned off after 15 minutes of inactivity and the system put into "sleep" mode after 30 minutes) were only expected to be implemented on 22% of PCs in 2010.

Given the financial and sustainability benefits there’s really no excuse for any commercial organisation not to have effective PC power management in place.

Home energy management users will reach 63 million by 2020 - Pike

In a new report Pike Research estimates that there will be just over one million users of home energy management systems (HEMs) worldwide in 2011. But by 2020 the figure is expected to reach 63 million, including cumulative shipments of IHDs (In-Home Displays) along with active users of web dashboards and mobile applications.

In fact, though, this is a downgrading of the research firm’s previous forecast. At the midpoint of the forecast period in 2015, HEM users are expected to reach 13 million – a previous forecast published in the fourth quarter of 2009 predicted 28 million users by that time. The lower estimate is put down to slower than anticipated adoption by utilities, along with a relative lack of pull from consumer demand.

Research Director Bob Gohn said that “The home energy management revolution will be delayed, but market growth will still be substantial by 2020. Utility programs are picking up steam, and are aided in some regions by a strong government push.  In addition, new technologies such as electric vehicles will be a significant driver of HEM adoption in the long term.”

The report maintains the HEM market is beginning to take shape as utilities look for ways to reduce peak demand and provide consumers with energy efficiency tools as part of their smart grid initiatives. HEM vendors are seeking to be ‘the face’ of the smart grid by providing consumers with actionable energy consumption information, often derived from smart meters. 

In fact, though, the market is still highly fragmented, with an increasingly crowded competitive landscape and a range of solution types, many no more than simple displays. Gohn says that in the next few years the market will include not only the current competitors, but also digital home companies such as consumer electronics manufacturers and broadband service providers, who have an increasing interest in adding energy management to their offerings.

 

Well home energy management is going to be a big market, potentially involving managing a wide range of devices and appliances and integrated with a home area network (HAN). But when and how it grows is very dependent on a number of factors, as Pike points out. The rate of implementation of smart grids, the availability of variable tariffs (which will give real financial rewards from energy management), the adoption of electric vehicles and the availability of other capabilities and services will all impact the rate of adoption. It’s all likely to be piecemeal and, to some extent, inter-dependent. It makes for an unpredictable market and difficult forecasting as various aspects come to the fore.

Certainly there will be competition for a dominant position in home energy management because, at least for the moment, it represents the gateway to the connected home.

Zero energy standby mode could save a quarter of data centre power

According to an article in The Guardian in the UK, NEC and Tohoku University in Japan have developed a new microchip that could prevent energy loss when electronic devices are left in standby mode. So a TV left on standby could use no power at all.

Normally, devices left on standby require circuits to be continually energised for a quick start. While this uses little power, with the multiple devices in use in most homes these days the total can mount up to as much as 10% of total home electricity use.

The new memory chip works by using small magnets, rather than electricity, to retain the data needed for a fast restart. So devices could be left on standby but restart instantly.

Prof. Naoki Kasai of Tohoku University pointed out that one scenario for significant savings is in data centres, where servers need to be quickly available at all times. Apparently the technology could cut data centre power consumption by around 25%.

 

Other articles suggest that the technology could be available by 2015 and it certainly could have a dramatic impact. Virtually every electronic device in the home now seems to have some sort of standby mode, wasting power. And most devices are left on standby because of the convenient, fast restart. There have been calls to do away with standby altogether on electronic devices because of the wasted power, but a better solution would be to retain standby but without the power use.

The impact in the data centre could be even more dramatic. Slow restart is a real hindrance to putting servers into a low-power mode - it’s why PC power management software, which could often work equally well on servers, is not deployed in the data centre. Instant restart would make hibernating servers a much more viable option.

Sony’s Open Planet Ideas winning concept is realised

You may recall my previous coverage of Open Planet Ideas, a collaborative green/tech project, launched by Sony Europe and supported by WWF, in which the public were invited to submit their ideas on how to repurpose existing Sony technologies to help tackle environmental issues. Around 400 ideas were received.

The last time I reported they were looking for input to help choose which one of the final eight shortlisted ideas should go forward to further development by Sony engineers.
Well the winner was chosen in January. It was an online magazine for a green-minded community. News is broadcast to members to inspire participation in local projects. This news and project are related by tags and news is distributed to users depending on their location, time available and capabilities.

Sony has now announced that the final concept is being taken forward as +U, a mobile app that will make volunteering more accessible by making bite size volunteering opportunities easily available. Sony is partnering with YouthNet - the organisation behind Do-it, the UK's largest volunteering database - to create +U. It’s an android app that combines real world volunteering opportunities with social and gaming incentives. Potential volunteers will be matched with local projects through geo-location technology and will be rewarded with points based on the voluntary opportunities they complete They will also be able to share their experiences and achievements on their social networks.

Well it sounds very good and congratulations to the winners and to Sony for putting the process together. I can’t help being a little disappointed, though. When I first reported on Open Planet Ideas I described it as “an online community incubator for collaborative technology solutions to critical environmental issues. The idea is to identify issues and tackle them through the innovative use of Sony technology”. I sort of hoped for more than a phone app.

Joulex raises $17m for global expansion

IT energy management company Joulex has raised $17m from a group of investors to expand its development and sales footprint into growth markets around the world.

Joulex provides enterprise energy management systems for data centres and distributed office environments. The company’s solution is JouleX Energy Manager (JEM), which can monitor and manage energy usage for all network-connected devices. The product’s main claim to fame is that it is agentless, i.e. it doesn’t need software to be installed on all managed devices, which makes it easier to implement. Joulex claims to be the only company to offer an agentless solution for complete enterprise energy management.

The money was raised from new investors Sigma Partners, Flybridge Capital Partners and Intel Capital, in addition to existing investors Target Partners and TechOperators. JouleX has around 100 customers in North America and Europe and recently announced the opening of a new office in Tokyo. 

 

There are a lot of companies pushing for business in the energy/emissions management software market, but Joulex seems to be catching a lot of the limelight.

It’s not the only company to have agentless software - I suspect the company’s success is more to do with being able to offer the solution across the enterprise. A one-stop shop has an advantage in a fragmented market. It will come up against a lot of established infrastructure companies who already have a presence in the data centre and have realised the importance of energy management, but then Cisco and Intel, among others, are partners.

Data centre energy management is a green ICT market that is likely to see some significant development in the coming years, and the Open Data Center Alliance may have some influence. The organisation has come up with eight usage models one of which encompass carbon footprint values and expectations for cloud services. More on that after I’ve talked to them at the end of the week.

BCS launches new green data centre training

The  UK’s BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT, has launched its new intermediate certificate in Energy and Cost Management for Data Centres. At the same time it has also updated its intermediate certificate in the EU Code of Conduct for Data Centres.

The new certificate covers:

• why managing data centre energy and cost is important

• what energy and cost management in the data centre involves

• predicting and demonstrating appropriate management steps

• comparing and distinguishing between energy and cost management options

It’s aimed at all those involved in running data centres, as well as business unit managers, IT purchasers, architects, solution consultants and CSR professionals.

The Institute has a number of green IT initiatives and believes that IT professionals need new skills to ensure IT can deliver solutions to help businesses to reduce their carbon emissions and meet growing legislation. The organisation points to the growing legislation, such as the UK’s CRC energy efficiency scheme, which makes it mandatory for those organisations covered by the legislation to understand and report their energy consumption. Michiel van der Voort, Director International and Professional Development Services at the Institute said: “There’s a real opportunity here for IT professionals to get ahead of the game, understand the legislation and the associated challenges of reducing emissions”. 

HP unveils the world’s most efficient data centre

HP has introduced what it claims is the world’s most efficient data centre. It’s not a purpose-built facility, but a modular design that HP claims will save up to 75% of the cost of a traditional data centre and up to 95% of the ongoing energy costs. 

HP POD 240a, also known as the EcoPOD, has a PUE from as low as 1.05 to 1.3, compared with the 2.4 rating that HP says is typical for a bricks and mortar facility. It’s HP’s first air-cooled modular data centre that automatically adjusts to the most efficient cooling method: free air from outside, DX (direct expansion) and DX assist (a combination of outside air and DX).

The data centre can be deployed in 12 weeks and ships directly to a customer complete with fully tested IT. By comparison the company maintains that it can take up to two years for a brick-built facility to be up and running. Fast installation is helped by the integration of power distribution and cooling systems - all users need to do is hook up the power and network.

 

The trend towards modular data centres is growing, and you can see why. It’s hard trying to predict capacity needs for any length of time, which you need to do for a large purpose-built facility. That’s particularly true if you end up with lots of empty space for years, that’s costing money now. A modular data centre can start small and scale up.

It’s also hard to design a data centre so that it can take advantage of new technology, cooling systems and power management capabilities in the future. A modular data centre potentially offers the most energy efficient technology and you only pay for what you need. But it does all depend on the cost.

Carbon management software and services market to reach $5.7bn by 2017 - Pike

According to a report from Pike Research, the global market for carbon management grew from $384m in 2009 to $705m in 2010 and is expected to reach $1.3bn in 2011. Growth will continue at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of almost 35% through to 2017, resulting in an industry worth $5.7bn. 

The Cleantech market intelligence firm has upped its forecasts published early last year which projected that the market in 2017 would be worth a more modest $4.4bn. A major driver for this increased growth is the efforts that companies are making to reduce and manage their energy consumption. As a result, carbon management is becoming synonymous with energy management. Senior Analyst Marianne Hedin said “Pure-play carbon management companies are redefining themselves as ‘energy management’ providers, and meanwhile large consulting firms and IT services companies, as well as energy service companies and building controls vendors, are expanding their offerings in the space.” Other market drivers are regulatory compliance, supply chain mandates and an ability to maintain or enhance brand equity to respond to the environmental pressures from shareholders and consumers.

Pike expects that revenue from services will increase their lead over software purchases as the market matures - services will grow from 55% of the total market in 2010 to 67% by 2017.   While consulting and implementation services represent the lion’s share of services spending today, spending for outsourcing services will be on par with or exceed the other types of services by 2016.

 

The findings confirm a Groom Energy Solutions study earlier this year that also found dramatic growth in the market. Groom predicted a 300% growth in the Enterprise Energy and Carbon Accounting (EECA) software market in 2011, after an even higher growth in 2010, and also pointed out the shift in products to include tracking of energy consumption along with carbon management

It’s certainly a booming software and services market and no longer reliant on legislation (or the threat of it) but becoming an integral requirement of doing business. It’s certainly the fastest growing green IT sector at the moment.

GE and EnOcean make the intelligent building easier

GE has formed a partnership with German technology company EnOcean to bring together GE’s automated building management systems with EnOcean’s battery-free wireless sensor technology. The net result will be the availability of GE’s HabiTEQ systems in locations where it is not possible to install wires or batteries.

HabiTEQ is an integrated system that runs a building’s lighting, heating, ventilation, blinds and security from a central control unit. It can be programmed with a PC and also response to environmental stimulus, changing the heating in a room in response to changes in external temperature, for example. Most HabiTEQ devices are also equipped to measure energy use, to help identify opportunities to reduce costs.

The EnOcean wireless devices are zero maintenance and use energy from ambient heat and light or from a switch being pressed, which makes them an environmentally friendly way of increasing efficiency. Using this wireless technology will make installation of GE’s smart building solutions cheaper and simpler as well as providing other aesthetic and practical benefits such as the ability to fit sensors in historic buildings.

GE Energy has also joined the EnOcean Alliance, a consortium of companies working to develop self-powered wireless monitoring and control systems by establishing common standards.

 

This news caught my eye because of its win-win appeal. GE’s smart building solution becomes quicker and easier to install with the use of wireless sensors that use no energy and are more aesthetically appealing. The easier, quicker and less obtrusive you can make these sorts of solutions the more likely the uptake, so this seems a step in the right direction.

The companies are also working on common standards. That’s the next issue in line if you want to assure commercial customers that they won’t have to rip it all out and start again some time in the near future.

Will the sustainable business market reach a tipping point in 2013? Verdantix thinks so.

The analyst firm Verdantix is predicting that the sustainable business market will reach a tipping point in 2013. It defines a tipping point as “A point in time when the adoption of an idea tips from incremental to exponential adoption”. Basically, Verdantix is saying that in 2013 the sustainable business market growth will accelerate and continue to accelerate.

According to firm there are three factors that drive a tipping point:

• People and groups who are contagious. Chief Sustainability Officers (CSO) with budget and authority are agents for change, particularly because they network with each other through professional associations and standards bodies and articulate the business case for sustainability.

• Convincing ideas that stick. The argument goes that global economic growth increases natural resource costs and causes risky environmental impacts and as a consequence changes the source of competitive advantage. This is a concept that sticks in the mind of CEOs much more than an ethical green argument.

• A business context that is receptive. Verdantix believes that the proven benefits from cleantech innovation, evidence that sustainability offerings can drive top line growth and a toughening policy stance on energy and climate change will, by 2013, create a new business context that will make CEOs more receptive to bigger investments in sustainable business initiatives.

I agree that all of the above will help drive sustainable business, but it’s not clear to me, even after listening in to the company’s webinar on the subject, why it will result in sudden exponential growth starting in 2013. The date prediction seems to be based primarily on the third factor, i.e. the business context. It’s the coming together of a number of factors, including growth in global economies, increased business experience in cleantech technologies such as electric vehicles and smart meters, the introduction of more climate change legislation, growing environmental concerns, and companies that have already had some success in sustainable business looking for increased investment to accelerate growth.

I hope Verdantix is right, but we have already had false starts and its not clear that much has changed. If global economies were in sync on the above points I would agree, but they are not:

• Countries (and industries) will emerge from the current economic slowdown at different times which will still be apparent in economic growth rates in 2013.

• There will still be a wide divergence in climate change legislation around the world by 2013. To reinforce the point, just this week Reuters reported that Christiana Figueres, head of the UN's climate secretariat, had acknowledged that UN talks will not be able to put into place a binding successor to the Kyoto Protocol by 2013 (Kyoto runs out in 2012).

• There remains varying public awareness and belief in the potential impact of climate change and it seems unlikely that the situation will change by 2013. That in itself creates differing sustainable business demands.

It’s clear that the growth in sustainable business will increase significantly in the coming years (it has to), but exactly how and when is not so clear. It seems to me it’s going to be patchy, which makes a dramatic tipping point unlikely. On the other hand, it depends on what you measure and how you identify a tipping point.

That’s my view anyway – I would be interested in what you think. Leave a comment and/or complete the poll on the web site.

Smart grids could bring $2 trillion in benefits to the US

The US Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) has published an interesting cost benefit analysis of deploying a smart grid in the US. Taking into account a range of technologies, applications and consumer benefits, the EPRI concludes that the cost of implementing a fully functional smart grid ranges from $338 billion to $476 billion, but the benefits would be worth between $1.3 trillion and $2 trillion.

The assessment considers the impact of grid technologies, ICT, market structures, other digital society demands, more widespread deployment of renewable power production, expansion and maintenance of existing infrastructure, and security technologies and systems. The full analysis is here.

It’s not the first time that EPRI, which describes itself as an independent, non-profit the organisation, has made such an assessment. In 2004 the organisation estimated the cost of implementing a smart grid at $165 billion and lead to a
benefit-to-cost ratio of 4:1. A separate report estimated that the smart grid could reduce CO2 emissions from the electric sector by 58% by 2030, relative to 2005 emissions.

The updated analysis assumes steady deployment of smart grid technologies from 2010 through to 2030.

 

Its a very detailed analysis which gives an insight into the issues that need to be taken into consideration in estimating smart grid benefits. 

The report does make the point that ‘deploying a smarter grid will require careful policy formulation, accelerated infrastructure investment, and a greater commitment to public-private research, development and demonstrations to overcome barriers and vulnerabilities’. Smart grids have obvious benefits, particularly in an energy-constrained world, but it’s a huge investment for any country and the challenges are not just technical. It requires political will and public acceptance to make it work. The latter may yet be the main challenge.

BT has published its latest sustainability report

BT has released its latest sustainability report which shows that it reduced carbon emissions by 3.6% between 2010 and 2011. Carbon intensity, which is emissions generated related to profit and employees, has been reduced by 59% since 1997. This is BT’s preferred method of reporting emissions, with a target (set in 2008) to cut carbon intensity by 80% from 1997 levels by 2020.

BT reduced energy consumption globally by 2.5%, saving more than £18m. Of that, £6.2m came from the use of smart control initiatives, with most electricity consumption now monitored through smart meters, which provide the means to track use and target savings.

In line with using less energy, BT also aims to generate a quarter of its UK energy needs from renewable sources by 2016. The company has obtained planning permission for its first wind farm site, which will supply 1% of electricity from 2012. Using bought-in renewable energy is also part of the plan. In the UK it sources 42% of electricity from renewable sources and has extended this contract to 2014. There are also green energy contracts in the Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Belgium and Luxembourg.

The company is including employees in its climate saving initiatives. The aim is to involve 20% of the workforce in climate-related activities by 2012 and over 15,000 (16%) have already signed up. There are 137 carbon clubs worldwide, energy saving campaigns around the business and 92 energy champions.

The above is just the climate change aspects of the company’s sustainability report, which is here.

 

Whatever you think of BT (they’re not the best loved on telecoms providers) the company is certainly making impressive efforts to improve its climate impact.

OK, so there is an argument to be had about whether carbon intensity is the best way for a company to target emissions reductions, since we need absolute reductions to save the planet. But I’ve listened to Chris Tuppen, who was BT’s Chief Sustainability Officer until the middle of last year, explain the methodology and it’s tie-in with global emissions reductions targets and he was pretty convincing. (Tuppen had high-level involvement with the Global Reporting Initiative, the Global e-Sustainability Initiative and the European Telecommunication Network Operators Association’s environmental working group and he was also a co-editor of the SMART 2020 report).

But BT admits that reducing emissions is only going to get harder: “Improving energy efficiency will become more challenging over time as we achieve many of the easy wins and due to the higher energy consumption of new infrastructure such as super-fast broadband”. Can’t help commenting that it might be worth the company joining GreenTouch, the organisation with the aim of increasing network energy efficiency by a factor of 1000 from current levels by 2015. BT is conspicuous by its absence

Finally, BT also reported that “Because progress at other proposed wind farm locations has been impacted by changes in local planning laws and local authority renewable generation targets we are exploring other options including solar photovoltaic cells (PV) and combined heat and power”. It’s regrettable that the changes to the planning laws introduced by the UK government seems to be closing the door on some sources of renewable energy.

Google continues to invest in green energy

There has been several news items about Google’s efforts to save energy and invest in renewables in recent weeks:

• The company’s has a new data centre in Hamina, Finland that uses sea water for cooling. The data centre is built in a historic mill on the Baltic Sea and Google maintains that it is one of its most technically innovative and environmentally conscientious facilities.

The cooling system pumps cold water from the sea, transfers heat from the data centre to the water through a heat exchanger and returns the sea water to the Gulf. It provides all the cooling needed all year, so no chillers are installed.

(All it needs is some good use for the warmed water - ed).

 

• Google is providing $55m to finance the 102 MW Alta IV project at the Alta Wind Energy Center (AWEC), which will generate 1,550 megawatts of energy when complete, enough to power 450,000 homes. It brings Google’s investment in clean energy to more than $400m.

Renewable energy developer Terra-Gen Power is constructing the site in several phases - Citibank, which has underwritten the equity for Alta Projects II-V, is also investing in this project.

 

The first five Alta projects are already operational. Google and Citi are purchasing the Alta IV project and will lease it back to Terra-Gen, who will manage and operate the wind projects under long-term agreements.While Google won’t be purchasing the electricity from the project, AWEC will help California meet its renewable target of 33% clean power by 2020.

• According to Reuters, Google and its partners have got through the first regulatory obstacle in their bid to build a $5bn transmission line off the Atlantic coast to support offshore wind farms. This is the project that I reported on back in October

It’s called the Atlantic Wind Connection (AWC) backbone and will stretch for 350 miles along the coast from New Jersey to Virginia with the ability to connect 6,000MW of offshore wind turbines. The idea is to connect offshore power hubs that will collect the power from offshore wind farms and deliver it via sub-sea cables to the most suitable points on the land-based transmission system.

The regulator has agreed that the companies backing the project can earn a 12.59% return on their investment, which is less than the 13.58% requested by the companies. The project's backers are Google, Good Energies, a private firm, and Japan's Marubeni Corp.

There are still a number of hurdles yet, though. According to Reuters the companies need approval from the Interior Department, several state agencies and the regional power grid operator. The companies hope to have the first phase of the transmission line operating in 2016.

Intel to introduce chips with faster wake-up

Intel has developed new features for its next generation Core processor-based laptops which means that machines can be woken up more quickly from sleep or hibernation mode, saving time and battery life.

The new features are known as Rapid Start Technology, which wakes the machine up more quickly, and Smart Connect Technology, which keeps email and social networks updated automatically, so they’re always ready. 

According to TechWorld, the Rapid Start works by writing the PC's application state to a dedicated flash drive so it can quickly reload to that state (from hibernation) without rebooting. Smart Connect continuously updates content when in standby mode by periodically waking up to check emails and social media updates, before reverting to a sleep mode.

The features, which were announced at the Computex IT trade show in Taipei, are apparently partly in response to the use of tablets. According to Intel's Executive Vice President Sean Maloney “Users simply do not want to wait for a device to boot up”.

 

Technology that makes it more convenient to use the low power sleep and hibernation modes must be a good thing. According to the Climate Savers Computing Initiative, less that a quarter of desktops and laptops are using effective low-power settings on their machines – delays in waking up will be a contributing factor.

But why wait until tablet users complained? Shouldn’t Intel have been working proactively to make sure that putting machines into a low powered state was as convenient as possible?