The A to Z of green IT

Data centres

Infamous for huge energy consumption and power-hungry air-con systems, data centres have a pretty poor green IT record.

Green IT from A to Z

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A is for Abroad
B is for Blades
C is for Carbon footprint
D is for Data centres
E is for Energy sources
F is for Freecycle
G is for Government
H is for Homeworking
I is for Ice caps
J is for Jobs (Steve)
K is for Kilowatts
L is for Landfill
M is for Mercury
N is for Nanogeneration
O is for Offsetting
P is for Paperless office
Q is for Queen
R is for Recycling
S is for SmartPlanet.com
T is for Travel
U is for Upgrade
V is for Virtualisation
W is for WEEE
X is for Xmas
Y is for You
Z is for Zero emissions

The energy consumed by data centres is also a significant - and growing - cost for many businesses. Today, energy costs typically form less than 10 per cent of an overall IT budget - but Gartner analysts have warned this could rise to around a third in the next few years.

So what to do about it? Well, with one-third of IT departments thinking green when choosing suppliers, vendor's ears have been burning and more eco-friendly centres are being developed.

For example, the Green Grid is an IT industry effort to lower the overall power consumption in data centres around the globe.

The group declared itself open for business at the beginning of this year and its members include AMD, APC, Dell, HP, IBM, Rackable Systems, SprayCool, Sun and VMware and, more recently, Intel.

IBM has also pledged $1bn per year to develop technology it hopes can double the capacity of its data centres without increasing energy use and the amount of space required.

As part of this greener drive, Big Blue also unveiled its flat-pack data centre this year, which it claims uses up to 15 per cent less power than a traditional centre.

Sun Microsystems unveiled its energy-efficient data centre drive recently and will launch a data centre in a shipping container, which it declares is greener and cheaper than an average set-up.

The UK has also unearthed its own zero-carbon emissions data centre - housed in a disused RAF bunker - which uses wind farms to power the subterranean site.