The chief information officer needs to be responsible for budgeting and paying for the energy used by the technology in an organisation, says Barry Bredenkamp, operations executive of the Central Energy Fund.
Speaking at the ITWeb Green IT forum, in Bryanston, yesterday, Bredenkamp said CIOs in SA "don't take the electricity consumption into account when they implement technology within the organisation".
With government and Eskom urging companies to save as much electricity as possible during the electricity crisis, Bredenkamp said firms will have to migrate electricity costs from financial officers to IT departments.
"While residential areas have felt a relaxation on the energy crisis, the mines are still running at only 90% capacity. Make no mistake, it's still a crisis."
He said energy saving and carbon emissions are not mutually exclusive. Businesses still need to look at how they use electricity, because SA's electricity production is primarily coal-based. This, noted Bredenkamp, adds to the carbon emissions South Africans and South African business owners contribute every day.
Conserve IT
Continuing the theme of CIOs' energy responsibilities, chief solutions architect at Dimension Data Wolf Stinnes pointed out that the pressure is mounting for CIOs to take increasing responsibility for green issues.
Not only are they going to have to look at energy saving, they are now being asked to contribute to other factors that may mediate the impact on the environment, he explained.
"IT can and should be used as an enabler. When we checked our carbon emissions, we realised we spent a lot of time flying to and from our international offices. This seriously contributed to our emissions."
In response to this, DiData decided to use video conferencing more frequently, which brought down the company's carbon footprint.
"There are many other ways to reduce the impact that a business will have on the environment using IT." In particular, Stinnes referred to allowing employees to work from home, saving both on space costs and fuel costs, while minimising the impact on the environment.