48GREEN YOUR IT
Astonishingly, computers are responsible worldwide for as much carbon emissions as the
entire airline industry. At least, so Cabinet Office minister Tom Watson informed us, in his
July 2008 speech at London’s Science Museum, when he announced the British government’s
intention to make all of its information and communications technology carbon-neutral
by 2012.
The statistics that the comparison is based on are and night through the whole working week, pushing
ultimately educated guesses at best, and, coming from energy consumption even higher. The government
a government minister, as easily informed by a political expects, by the simple expedient of ensuring all their
agenda as by science – but they estimate that IT and computers are switched off in the 16 hours per day
airlines are each account for around two percent of that fall outside of normal office hours, to have an
global CO2 emissions. impact equal to taking 40,000 cars off the roads.
A major difference between the two sectors, however, The government’s new energy-saving IT regime will
is that with IT, just a few extremely simples, measures include a centralized system that detects when a
– along the lines of those announced by Whitehall computer is not being used and puts it to sleep.
– will result in immediate and significant savings in
energy consumption and money. But it is simplicity itself to utilise the power
management settings built into every operating system
A typical PC uses some 600 kilowatt-hours of to achieve the same, as well as to have the monitor
electricity per year, of which easily 400 kW-hours sleep rather than switch to an active screen-saver,
are wasted by leaving the computer or its monitor or which uses as much power as a screen that is fully
printer on full power when the machine is essentially on. This can result in energy savings of at least 60-70
standing idle. But in many large organisations, percent, and sometimes as much as 90 percent. With
computers and other equipment are left running all day the rising cost of energy, this can mean savings of
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