The Energy Challenge: Efficiency, Not Just Alternatives, Is Promoted as an Energy Saver
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Even supporters of alternative energy agree that the easiest way to cut carbon emissions and air pollution is to focus more on efficiency.
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A pilot program in the Pacific Northwest shows significant promise for saving homeowners on energy costs, and participants in the Pacific Northwest GridWise pilot said they liked the remote home-management capabilities, too.
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Energy law sets efficiency levels for cars and homes but environmentalists say measures are too limited
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A team of US scientists show off a novel device that harvests energy from human movements.
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Smart meters can help identify where energy is being wasted, but only if the devices offer meaningful information.
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Air cooled by ice is just as efficient -- and more environmentally friendly -- than traditional air-conditioning systems. It's also taking pressure of the city's power grid.
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(Source: EMC)  Is energy efficiency a major challenge in your business? In this Pund-IT report, explore efficiencies offered by EMC, such as EMC Centera, which delivers a 67 percent energy savings over previous versions; enhanced EMC CLARiiON arrays that deliver energy savings of 33 percent; and the new EMC Power Calculator, which predicts power consumption and cooling requirements. Read more.
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As the summer swelters on, skyscrapers and apartments around the city will crank up air conditioners and push the city's power grid to the limit &#151; but some have found a cool alternative.
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Environmentally friendly tech and hybrids dominate this year's Geneva Motor Show, making fuel efficiency the top theme in a climate of global warming concerns. By the Associated Press.
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(InfoWorld) - The U.S Department of Energy (DOE) is stressing incentives over regulations to improve the energy efficiency of datacenters. The DOE's office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) gathered the top technology companies in Silicon Valley Wednesday to promote collaboration on strategies to improve overall energy efficiency.Â Datacenter energy issuesÂ are a growing concern for businesses and users as computers get more powerful, and the cost of running them and keeping them cool continues to increase. Technology vendors represented at the forum, including rival chip makers Advanced Micro Devices and Intel, along with server vendors such as IBM, Hewlett-Packard, andÂ Sun Microsystems, have each been developing more energy-efficient products. But they and the DOE representatives acknowledged that datacenter energy usage needs to be addressed holistically. The DOE can be a resource to the industry, not a regulator requiring datacenters to meet energy efficiency goals, said Andy Karsner, head of the EERE program. "I donât know that right now thereâs a dramatic need for a regulatory move, particularly when you have the leaders of the industryâ¦coming here with a sense of purpose,â said Karsner. Industry representatives said they work independently on improving the energy efficiency of individual products but that the federal government could provide tax credits, other financial incentives, or other resources to enhance overall energy efficiency. "AMD and Intel keep doing their best to improve the performance [of processors], but the CPU is only half the story.â said Kris Singh, director of strategic platform technology programs at AMD, which hosted the daylong energy conference at its headquarters in Sunnyvale, California. Because this was the first meeting of what the DOE called a "tech industry working group," no specific recommendations were made and the schedule for future work remained open. The DOE can fund research that individual product makers can't fund to look at how different components could work better together, said David Rodgers, acting deputy assistant secretary of EERE. "A hardware company might improve theÂ energy efficiency of a blade serverÂ and another company might improve the energy efficiency of a transformer to convert AC to DC. Right now very few people are doing research on how to integrate those two together," said Rodgers. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency sponsors theÂ Energy Star programÂ rating the energy efficiency of home appliances such as refrigerators and air conditioners and some commercial equipment. But some participants in the working group are skeptical that a comparable program could be applied to datacenters. âIâm not sure about that," said Roger Schmidt, chief thermal architect at IBM. Because datacenters are much more complex with components from different manufacturers, it'd be hard to develop one Energy Star rating everyone would agree upon. "What if [the rating] is bad, what do you do? Who are you going to point the finger to?â Schmidt asked.
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A record number of buildings, from skyscrapers to supermarkets, won special recognition by U.S. regulators for being energy efficient in 2006.
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SDE BOKER, Israel  - Reflective dishes may be the answer to make solar energy competitive with conventional sources of power, Israeli scientists say.
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(InfoWorld) - I recently moved from a small apartment in Oakland to a new house in Sacramento. The cat and I are adjusting quite well, thank you, though for about one month, I was without a kitchen. Or a water heater. Or downstairs flooring. It may not have been the best-laid renovation plan. I do have new kitchen appliances, which spent quite some time looming largely and uselessly off to the side of the future kitchen. They're very shiny, which is nice, and they're Energy Star certified, of course I say "Of course," because in this day and age, Energy Starred fridges and stoves and the like are incredibly easy to come by. Plus, they come with little tags that tell you how much you'll save in energy bills per year. Oh, and the local utility will give me money for buying them. So how could I go wrong investing in a green kitchen? Alas, for IT, it's not nearly so easy being green. Swapping out a fridge isn't as quick, straight-forward, or nondisruptive as swapping out a server rack or farm. Determining the potential long-term savings for a bunch of new laptops isn't as simple of figuring out how much you'll save with a new stove (it's right there on the tag). Deciding where to place the dishwasher is pretty much a no-brainer whereas figuring out how to set up your server racks to maximize energy efficiency can be exceedingly complex. In fact, it's likely that you, or whoever runs your business, has seemingly more important things on the brain than developing a strategy for a greener, more energy-efficient operation: boosting sales; keeping the network secure and running; and figuring out who's been stealing Hot Pockets from the Energy Star fridge in the break room. Perhaps youâre not sure where to begin. Or perhaps you're not even convinced that going green -- or greener -- is a worthwhile endeavor, or something you can really afford. Well, let's explore the question -- or rather some answers to the question -- of why going green should matter to you in the first place. 1. Going green really can save you money. For many organizations, that benefit may well be the foremost argument for adopting more eco-friendly practices. Less energy consumption means lower bills -- and hereâs the kicker: You're likely burning (or cooling) away thousands of dollars each year paying for energy that's really not contributing to your bottom line. One of the biggest culprits: cooling costs for the datacenter. In fact, by 2010 IDC predicts that companies will be spending an additional 70 cents per dollar invested in a new server. That's up from 50 cents on the dollar in 2005 and 21 cents per buck in 2000. You'll certainly want to prepare as those costs creep up. It doesn't end there: Waste abounds at organizations, and research has found that companies that work to reduce their environmental impact tend to perform better than their counterparts. Fortunately, there are cost-saving strategies out there. Among them is re-thinking the kind of equipment you can buy (more energy-efficient hardware and standards are coming out all the time), the technologies you employ, such as virtualization and thin clients, and even the way you lay out your datacenter. 2. Going green will help reduce the impact of the imminent energy crisis. Yes, I know: Crisis is often one of those words that media types throw around to cause panic and sell magazines or newspapers or drive Web site traffic. Nevertheless, based on the research I've seen, crisis is an apt word. Right now, energy supply looks to be struggling to keep up with demand. A recent study by the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory concludes that, thanks to the industry shift to low-end servers, global power consumption has doubled since 2000 to more than 123 million kw/hours. Power demands are expected to increase by 40 percent come 2010 -- and that's assuming that per-server power consumption remains at 2005 rates. Or consider what Gartner proclaimed at the end of 2006: Half of datacenters will run out of power by 2008. As explained by Timothy Morgan at ITJungle: "Gartner did not, by the way, literally mean that datacenters would go dark in two years after blowing some fuses or melting under their own heat. What Gartner did say was that by the end of 2008, 50 percent of the datacenters in the world would not have enough power to meet the power and cooling requirements of the high-density computing gear that vendors are increasingly peddling." Although this prediction doesn't mean it's time to get hysterical, or start training an army of hamsters to power your server farm, it should certainly be a compelling reason to start looking at ways to conserve energy. Want more information? Check out this Webcast from The Uptime Institute about "The Invisible Crisis in the Data Center." (Registration is required for viewing.) 3. Going green is good PR. Both environmentally- and economically-conscious people like a good news article about the ways companies are leveraging green technology, be it simply investing in more energy-efficient gear, or putting solar panels on top of their datacenters. That kind of positive publicity is good advertising, which also can offset some of the cost of investing in green IT. (These kinds of case studies can also provide useful guides for other companies looking for ways to cut energy costs.) 4. Going green is good for the environment. Ah yes, the environment. Trees. Oceans. Fresh air. Turtles. I'm personally in favor of all of those things (even those vicious snapping turtles that would bite off a toe without a second thought). And IT commerce in general has a huge impact on the environment, such as landfills piled up with improperly discarded computers and servers, wasted printer paper, as well carbon dioxides contributing to global warming. Yes, I do realize that some people remain skeptical as to whether or not global warming is real and a concern. (Some people also remain skeptical whether the Earth is flat and whether it revolves around the Sun.) Too flippant? Perhaps. Let's just say that even the previously skeptical political leaders of the world are acknowledging that global warming warrants consideration, and that it requires reducing the carbon dioxides and toxins we spew into environment (and later inhale). And even if you disagree with those who proclaim global warming a concern, you'd best prepare for forthcoming regulations on reducing energy waste -- or risk legal headaches. Yes, there may be a significant up-front cost required to switch to leaner, greener machines -- but there are also incentives out there (federal and local) to help you get the job done. I'll help keep you abreast of those in the coming days and weeks. So there you have it: four simple reasons to consider embracing green IT at your organization. Be sure to check in regularly at my Sustainable IT blog for the latest news and analyses about green IT.
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New materials provide a potentially cheaper way to reduce carbon dioxide emissions from power plants.
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By ANDREE FRIEZE WE'RE all being told to cut the amount of energy we use in our homes to save the planet and its resources. But how can we do this, especially in high-consumption places like kitchens? ANDREE FRIEZE shows you how... and ways to save cash by going green. Reduce..
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US researchers demonstrate a system to transfer energy to devices without the need for wires.
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How non-green is your network? Energy saving has so far focused on PCs, servers and the like, but now networks have been fingered as major wasters of power. An industry group has claimed that Ethernet's poor use of energy could be wasting as much as $450m a year - or 5.8TW/h - in the US. And perhaps three times that much, worldwide.â¦