The announcement of Apple’s iPad has been much anticipated by a world with an ever-increasing appetite for mobile computing devices as a way to connect, interact, learn and work... From their smart phones and netbooks, the crowd feverishly blogged and tweeted real time updates out to a curious world. Whether you actually want an iPad or not, there is no doubt that it is a harbinger of things to come. The iPad relies upon cloud-based computing to stream video, download music and books, and fetch email. Already, millions access the ‘cloud’ to make use of online social networks, watch streaming video, check email and create documents, and store thousands of digital photos online on popular web-hosted sites like Flickr and Picasa.
What is CLOUD……?
The term cloud, or cloud computing, used as a metaphor for the internet, is based on an infrastructure and business model whereby - rather than being stored on your own device - data, entertainment, news and other products and services are delivered to your device, in real time, from the internet. The creation of the cloud has been a boon both to the companies hosting it and to consumers who now need nothing but a personal computer and internet access to fulfil most of their computing needs.
Citing examples……..
Google is perhaps the most famous cloud-based company to demonstrate the potential of a cloud platform to drive a hugely successful business model. All of Google’s signature products - Gmail, Google Documents and Google Earth - are delivered from the cloud. The cloud is growing at a time when climate change and reducing emissions from energy use is of paramount concern. With the growth of the cloud, however, comes an increasing demand for energy. For all of this content to be delivered to us in real time, virtual mountains of video, pictures and other data must be stored somewhere and be available for almost instantaneous access. That ‘somewhere’ is data centres - massive storage facilities that consume incredible amounts of energy.
Facebook in January 2010 commissioned a new data centre in Oregon and committed to a power service provider agreement with PacificCorp, a utility that gets the majority of its energy from coal-fired power stations, the United States’ largest source of greenhouse gas emissions. Effectively becoming an industrial-scale consumer of electricity, Facebook now faces the same choices and challenges that other large ‘cloud-computing’ companies have in building their data centres. With a premium being placed on access to the cheapest electricity available on the grid. In many countries, this means dirty coal.
How big is the carbon footprint of the Information Technology and Communication sector (ICT)?
In 2008, The Climate Group and the Global e-Sustainability Initiative (GeSI) issued SMART 2020 in which it was found that:
• PC ownership will quadruple between 2007 and 2020 to 4 billion devices, and emissions ill double over the same period, with laptops overtaking desktops as the main source of global ICT emissions (22%).
• Mobile phone ownership will almost double to nearly 5 billion accounts by 2020, but emissions will only grow by 4%. Broadband uptake will treble to almost 900 million accounts over the same period, with emissions doubling over the entire telecoms infrastructure.
Cloud Computing Growth….. WHY?
• Continued significant expansion of cloud-based computing despite economic downturn.
• Greater attention and growth in deployment of energy-efficient data centres design.
• Increased size and scale of data centres being built by major brands.
Key trends that will impact the environmental footprint of the cloud…..
• Projected regional growth of data centres
Unless cloud data centres are strategically placed to utilise or be co-developed with renewable sources of electricity, the data centre operators are stuck with the same problem everybody has, and having to accept the mix of clean and dirty energy sources that the electric utilities rely upon to feed the grid.
• Growth of energy-efficient data centres
More cloud-computing companies are pursuing design and siting strategies that can reduce the energy consumption of their data centres, primarily as a cost containment measure. For most companies, the environmental benefits of green data design are generally of secondary concern. Increasing the energy efficiency of its servers and reducing the energy footprint of the infrastructure of data centres are clearly to be commended.
• Virtualization Technology
Virtualization dramatically improves the efficiency and availability of resources and applications of an organization. Technology like Virtual storage and Virtual server reduces capital costs by increasing energy efficiency and requiring less hardware and increasing your server to admin ratio.
Cool IT Campaign…… “Brown cloud or green cloud?”
Greenpeace’s Energy [R]evolution Scenario provides a practical blueprint for the worlds Renewable energy future. The ICT sector holds many of the keys to reaching our climate goals by innovating solutions to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions and increase energy efficiency by rapid deployment of renewable electricity generation economy-wide, and place greater R&D into storage devices that will deliver electricity from renewable sources 24/7. Technologies that enable smart grids, zero emissions buildings, and more efficient transport systems are central to efforts to combat climate change. The ICT sector’s abilities to lead and to innovate are the reasons Greenpeace began its Cool IT Campaign in 2009. The campaign uses direct company engagement (Companies like Facebook, Google, and other large players) and public engagement to provide pressure on the ICT industry to put forward solutions to achieve economy-wide greenhouse gas emissions reductions and to be strong advocates for policies that combat climate change and increase the use of renewable energy. .
“I have always believed that IT is the engine of an efficient economy; it also can drive a greener one” Michael Dell, Forbes magazine
“We cannot solve the world’s problems with the same thinking that created them…….”Albert Einstein.
Let’s work together to transform these words into reality……
