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Green IT Solutions - Top 8 Initiatives for 2011

  

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What does “Green IT” mean to you? For many, thoughts go immediately to energy-efficient servers, power-save modes, and other things relating to hardware in a data center. Those are all valid, but it's really the tip of the iceberg. Sustainable IT applies to many areas within an IT organization's immediate realm, but it also touches many more areas in other parts of a company, which can be made more efficient and sustainable with the help of IT-supported technologies.

The next question is, why go green? Whatever the case, it's making an impact. Companies understand that going green saves a lot of greenbacks and opens the door to a bigger pool of customers, and they are taking action. Here are some examples of green IT initiatives that are being implemented at companies right now.

Consolidate servers using virtualization software

Traditional application servers are inefficient because they are dedicated to a specific set of tasks and are probably not running all the time. This means you need lots of different servers, each of which is costly to run and to cool, uses large amounts of energy, and whose manufacture generated large environmental impacts. By contrast, server virtualization is a software technology that creates multiple virtual servers out of a single server. Because it lets you use your machines at much higher capacity, you minimize idle time and need fewer machines overall. In a big company, this can even mean fewer server facilities. Use less energy, save on equipment and operating expenses, and reduce your maintenance burden as well.

Consolidate printers through an output management initiative

Do you know how many printers you've got in your company? How much power are they using? What are they costing you in electricity, paper, and ink? If you don't already have a print output management framework in place, you probably have no way to answer these questions. That means you're really missing out on some big, green, money-saving opportunities. Getting a birds' eye view of your company's overall printing activities is the first step towards consolidating your equipment. Most printers are left on all day but are working only part of the time. Even with power-save modes, this is clearly inefficient. Instead, manage all your printing centrally and run fewer machines at high capacity.

Move from traditional PCs to “Thin Clients”

It's amazing how some really obvious things can go unnoticed for a long time. For example, why is that everyone in the whole company needs a power-sucking CPU at their desk? Why not just have a mouse, a keyboard, and a screen, and keep all the really power-thirsty parts in one central location? “Thin clients” are just that. All your storage and applications sit on a shared server that you see from a virtual desktop. This not only saves big on power usage. It also makes it much easier to centrally manage software upgrades in a coordinated fashion. And because they don't have their own CPUs or storage, thin clients won't become obsolete nearly as quickly as a regular desktop PC, and enjoy a much longer operational lifetime.

Invest in power-saving automation technologies

Your office has smart lighting that turns off when no one's in the room. Your computers have power-saving sleep modes, but those are decentralized and up to each user to set. Maybe those machines are powering down, maybe they're not. Then there are the shared work stations that no one person takes responsibility for. At any given moment, there are probably a lot of machines that are still awake with no one working at them and no critical processes running. Instead of leaving all of this up to chance, why not look at intelligent, centrally managed power-saving automation for all your equipment? Power them down automatically when it's appropriate; let them keep running when they need to.

Print Suppression: using inter/intranet, PDFs, and email to minimize printing

Back in the days of the slide-rule, people used to predict that the digital age would spell the end of paper. Until recently, most people would say, 'Boy, did they get that wrong!' For decades, the computerization of industry and the office actually resulted in much greater use of printed paper. Today, however, a combination of awareness and flexible electronic media have brought the original prediction much closer to reality.

Today, people obviously have many alternatives to printing on paper. Email, intranets, and the Internet have made  it possible to share information faster and more conveniently than on paper. PDF documents offer a universally compatible format into which nearly any other format (word-processed documents, spreadsheets, presentations, etc.) can be distilled.

Hardcopy may still be appropriate in various circumstances, but on-demand systems ensure that only as many copies as needed are printed, eliminating wasted paper. Many companies now encourage employees to use their printers' double-sided printing option, cutting daily paper consumption in half.

Electronic signatures and automated approvals loops have not only made various forms of physical paperwork (e.g., purchase requisitions) obsolete; they actually help the work happen faster. All of this saves trees, saves energy, lets you operate with fewer printers, and saves a lot of money.

Tools to increase awareness

Most people use printers without any idea how much impact and cost is being incurred with each use. How can you even start to change usage habits without some way to let people see the connection? Now you can. Moving to a print output management framework includes, among several advantages, the ability to monitor printer usage on a department and individual user level. Employees and management can see exactly how much each print job is costing in terms of environmental impact and cost. From there, it's much easier to establish cost accountability, encourage double-side printing, and minimize non-essential paper printing.

Moving away from direct mail and low-return marketing

If you're going to bother sending marketing materials to customers and potential customers, it had better relate to them directly. It should also reflect other relevant data (e.g., order history and seasonal patterns) that you have about them, and offer additional, related services. With modern output-management systems, it becomes significantly easier to automate the production, distribution, and revisions of customized, targeted materials. Why waste paper, diesel fuel, and money shipping out direct mailers with low return? Instead, reduce mailing costs and save paper and money, while producing material that is more likely to impress your customers favourably.

Telecommuting

Whether it's daily commuting or business trips by air, moving people around has a big cost. Today, thanks to widespread remote access technologies, more and more companies offer flexible telecommuting options to their employees. Not only does this spare the air and save energy; it can also help productivity through greater work flexibility and reduced commuting stress.

Similarly, business flights and the in-person meeting have really been scaled back at most companies, thanks to improved teleconferencing, videoconferencing, and web-based meetings. This saves transportation and lodging expenses, while reducing the significant environmental impacts associated with air travel.

Doing well by doing good

It should be pretty clear from these examples that numerous opportunities already exist for a company to become more green while saving money and improving efficiency and quality. What's usually needed to realize these changes is experienced, expert advice. What's the best software? How do we implement this successfully with minimal disruption? With the help of an experienced, expert consultant, a company can not only achieve a greener IT department, but can also enable IT with the tools to effect green changes throughout the company. Meet the emerging green industry standards, satisfy your customers green sourcing requirements, get those key certifications, and (wait for it...) save money.

Want to read more on Green IT? We've expanded this blog post into a white paper called "The Top 10 Green IT Projects for 2011." Download it here.

What Green IT Projects are you planning for 2011? We'd love to hear your ideas. Use the comments area below.