By Juliana Wimmer
For years, environmental issues have been of great importance in Europe. In particular, climate protection is increasingly at the centre of discussion in German politics. Attention has focused on how different industries can reduce their emissions, such as the environmental pollution caused by the air traffic industry.
The IT industry is also being targeted to reduce CO2 emissions, adopt energy-saving measures, and recycle e-waste etc. This is especially important considering that IT equipment is responsible for about 2% of the global CO2 emissions, which is actually equal to the pollution caused by air traffic.
However, it seems that the importance of environmental issues in the IT industry is viewed differently across Europe. According to a survey by Hitachi Data Systems (HDS), Scandinavia and the Benelux are outriders in the field of green IT: for one third of the CTOs there, green IT is a key priority, whereas only 14% of their German and middle-European counterparts share their opinion. A worrying 27% state that green IT plays no role at all.
But perhaps surprisingly, given the US reluctance to ratify the Kyoto protocol, it’s American IT companies that are taking the lead in environmental protection. IBM for example has launched Project Big Green, which has allocated 1 billion dollars per year to develop more environmentally-friendly technologies. The project includes new products and services to sharply reduce data centre energy consumption, with an aim to ‘green’ the world’s business and public technology infrastructures.
Other big companies such as HP, Dell or Sun are cooperating in an industrial consortium called the Green Grid to lower the overall consumption of power in data centres around the globe and to develop meaningful, platform-neutral standards, measurement methods, processes and new technologies to improve IT energy efficiency.
The question is, will such initiatives provide just guidelines or will they become coercive for all IT companies one day? In Europe, the regulations (eg. WEEE, RoHS, REACH, EuP) already implemented put a certain pressure on providers and end-users by fixing limit values that must not be crossed. However, I believe that further regulation is necessary to permanently reduce CO2 emissions and turn good intentions into action.
For instance, a recent survey by Forrester shows that 85% of the CIOs think that environmental protection is important, but only 25% believe that green IT should be an inherent part of the procurement process. Is it because they’re not familiar with green IT yet - or because they’re lacking the will to actually do something?
Ultimately, it all comes down to whether the implementation of environmentally friendly strategies will contribute to cost reduction. As one CTO has put it: “We would produce green because it’s reasonable for the business, not because it’s green”. Another was even more direct: “We don’t do this because we’re nice people, but because we want to make money”.
Going green for profit – now there’s an idea…
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