Green wash and wear

The IT industry has a deserved reputation for not actually implementing what it sells, which is at least partly why anything new is treated with scepticism by end-user communities too long overloaded with vendor marketing hype. That said, as far as green IT goes, the industry seems at least willing to taste-test its own lunch, even if few technology companies have progressed to the point of enjoying an end-to-end green meal.

Going green is not a simple task. Green encompasses everything from the sourcing of the materials used in product manufacture, to the composition of said materials, the manufacturing process, how and how far goods are transported, what packaging is used, how products are implemented, used and disposed of, to put it very simply.

For any organisation to change its way of working to ensure that everything procured, utilised or produced is 100% green is a mammoth task - there's data centres, manufacturing plants, buildings, vehicle fleets, etcetera. This is not a cheap exercise, and, quite frankly, no one is going to go green unless there's a sound business case behind the move, legislative and regulatory imperatives notwithstanding.

For IT organisations, going green is even more complicated. Says Gartner research VP Simon Mingay: “Demonstrating or proving relative 'greenness' is very difficult for ICT providers. Most customers don't understand what it takes for a technology or service provider to be green, and they have even less time to figure it out. A lack of standards or metrics against which greenness can be measured exacerbates the problem. Some technology providers would love to talk about embodied energy, but a lack of standards and how embodied energy is calculated means there's no level playing field. This leaves providers exposed to someone else claiming a lower footprint.

“Showing leadership involves being ahead of most of your customers, but it makes little commercial sense and brings with it commercial risk if you are too far ahead of them. The providers will go where customers and regulators push them. To a large extent, we get the IT industry we deserve. All stakeholders must play their part in improving the environmental performance of the industry.”

Green IT, says Mingay, is an oxymoron. “IT is not, and never will be, green. Marketing departments tend to get carried away in their eagerness to paint things green, resulting in some level of 'green washing',” he states.

Itec product marketing manager Holger Groenert says his company has its house in order. “Firstly, we don't entertain individual desktop printers on desks, bearing in mind the energy consumption of a desktop laser is not much different to a mid-size multifunctional device (MFD), which can do 10 times the workload.”

IT is not, and never will be, green.

Simon Mingay, research VP, Gartner

Itec has stationed MFDs in every department. This, says Groenert, saves money and power. “Most measures have been implemented to save cost and have a positive reflection on the green status of the office.”

Itec has also constrained output per department, using software that runs on its network. It has recycle bins next to printers and copiers. It enforces duplex printing and has secure mailboxes on its MFDs, which don't print any given job until the person responsible has typed their password in - this minimises the “print without collecting” problem experienced in so many offices.

But while it encourages its customers to always keep up to date with the latest technology by refreshing annually, on the grounds that newer machines are more energy-efficient, Itec only refreshes its own fleet every two years.

Groenert also faces the same challenge many other local organisations do: the company imports product, rebrands and/or customises it, and sells it onto dealers. “Head office has its house in order, but I have to say that what dealers do isn't under our control.”

As far as its PC fleet is concerned, old equipment from Itec's head office goes to its dealers to use as loan machines. Should any of those machines find their way onto a dump, the company will be held liable, irrespective of which dealer actually did the dumping.

Eaton Power Quality has a very small South African office with only seven employees. That hasn't stopped the locals from fitting in with the company's global green IT initiatives, though. “Eaton has a department for Environmental Health and Safety, and runs annual internal awards. The company employs 80 000 people worldwide across the automotive, aerospace, electrical, hydraulics and truck industries,” says Eaton Power Quality SA country manager Christelle Larkins.

The company has implemented a system to ensure every factory and office is environmentally friendly in its operations - from recycling to electricity savings, water and waste. It also ensures its products meet internal green standards.

As noted, the local Eaton office is very small, but, says Larkins, everyone does their bit: “We have a UPS. We've rewired the lights to use minimal power. We've gone fax-to-e-mail as far as possible. We have all the lighting hooked up to a master switch so that the last person to leave can turn them all off in one go. We don't have the volumes yet to do recycling, but as we grow, I'll look at that.”

We decommissioned more than 5 000 devices.

Hein van der Merwe, chief technologist for the EMMA region, Sun Microsystems

On the other end of the scale is Sun Microsystems, which has completely revamped three of its data centres. Says Hein van der Merwe, chief technologist for the EMMA (Eastern Mediterranean, Middle East and Africa) region: “One was a traditional computing data centre, and the second running Sun's desktop environment.” The third serves a number of Sun's R&D groups. Located in the US, Europe and India respectively, each data centre now runs what was previously handled by a number of separate centres.

In the case of the first centre in California, Van der Merwe says Sun found it could refresh the technology and replace it with new, more eco-friendly kit, therein achieving a power and space saving as well as increase the centre's capacity.

“We approached it with the view that we couldn't do an eco-friendly initiative if it didn't make economic sense,” he says.

Following the revamp, the data centre has 450% more compute power and saved the company $980 000 in power costs in the first nine months. Storage capacity increased 240%, while device numbers decreased from 738 to 225. Likewise, the centre's previous 2 177 physical servers have been consolidated to 1 240.

“We decommissioned more than 5 000 devices through the process (storage, networking and servers) and cut carbon emissions by 3 227 metric tons. We've driven utilisation up to 85% on servers,” he adds.

The company's European centre runs its desktop environment. As part of its desktop strategy, Sun deploys SunRay devices - low power, dumb terminals. “Two switches control billions of dollars worth of savings for US companies - light switches and power switches,” he says. “Because the SunRay is stateless, you can switch off a whole building's power without fear of losing anyone's work. We've been running SunRay-based infrastructure for 10 years, starting with the US offices and filtering out from there.”

Consolidation in the European data centre was initially around infrastructure supporting development activities. It achieved an 80% reduction in server and storage space, leading to a 50% reduction in power and cooling requirements - a saving of $118 000 per year in utility costs. “We managed to achieve a consolidation ratio of 22 to four in that environment,” Van der Merwe says.

The Indian research and development centre reduced its power consumption by 17%, space requirement by 51%, and increased its compute capacity by 154%. Sun recycles decommissioned equipment and offers this service to customers too.

IBM started its green initiatives in 1971 and is still enhancing and improving these programmes. This is a clear demonstration of the long-term commitment IBM has placed on the need to be eco-friendly. Says IBM business development executive for sub-Saharan Africa, Maureen Baird: “We've had environmental and energy efficiency policies entrenched for a long time, and not just since the start of the current crisis. IBM's goal is to redeploy $10 million into its Project Green initiative between 2007 and 2012 - this will go into research and development, products and our own environmental affairs policies.”

In 1994, IBM started with internal IT. “Our share price went through the floor and we looked at how we could improve business operations. We had over 300 data centres and have since consolidated down to 30,” she adds.

Interestingly, IBM has also consolidated its CIOs - from having almost one per country to one corporate CIO overseeing the entire infrastructure. Its application portfolio has been reduced from over 5 000 applications to about 400.

“We still have a way to go,” Baird says. Last year, she adds, the company built its biggest data centre to date - in Colorado - and built it green from the ground up. It also collaborates with partners like SAP and has linked product development to them, which Baird says has reduced IBM's carbon footprint.

“These moves have resulted in significant savings for IBM,” she adds, “to the tune of millions of dollars.”

The IT industry, we're frequently told, is responsible for as much as 2% of the world's carbon footprint, but as Gartner's Mingay notes, IT by its nature is never going to be green. That said, there's a lot that local and global organisations can do to minimise the environmental impact of their activities. It's never too late to start - until legislation or regulation catches up with you, that is. Both are on the cards.