Silicon start-up gets green light

Silicon start-up Smooth-Stone has received $48 million from a syndicate of investors including ARM, Texas Instruments, and Highland Capital Ventures, reports CNET News.

Smooth-Stone's goal is to bring the virtues of low-power cellphone technology to servers and, as a result, bring down the staggering power consumption at large data centres.

Smooth-Stone joins other start-ups such as US Department of Energy-backed SeaMicro, which is using Intel's power-sipping Atom chips to achieve the same end.

Pike Research has introduced a green IT advisory service, which provides market intelligence and strategy insights for companies seeking to improve the energy-efficiency of IT operations, states Sun Herald.

The service analyses opportunities for greener data centres, telecommunications networks, and electronics products, as well as emerging markets for IT in energy management and smart grid systems.

“The global IT industry faces a unique opportunity to reduce its own energy costs and carbon footprint, in addition to having a substantial impact on the energy efficiency of other industries,” says managing director Clint Wheelock.

An Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) programme that encourages US federal agencies to recycle old computers and other electronics has achieved limited success throughout government and the nation, federal auditors said, reveals NextGov.

A new Government Accountability Office report noted initiatives EPA co-manages with partners inside and outside government to promote voluntary green technology practices have had a positive, but limited, effect on recycling e-waste.

One programme that was highlighted - the Federal Electronics Challenge - asks agencies to buy eco-friendly information technology, save energy when using equipment, and discard used electronics in an environmentally sound manner.