Question: Many organisations are falling over themselves to Of course, if 40 per cent of energy use is in data centres for IT, then
implement the latest green fad – but what’s the best strategy 60 per cent must be in non data centre use, the vast majority of
for a sustained, long-term, technology-driven approach? which is in Desktop PC use. In this arena, where business demands
permit, a focus on a Virtual Thin Client solution makes drastic cuts in
IB: HP believes that the best strategy is to have a long-standing energy consumption.
commitment to the environment, with a design for the environment
programme that covers the whole product lifecycle from materials Question: Enterprise mobility – mobile and wireless IT – is
and design, to manufacturing and supply chain, to use and end of crucial to a modern business, but how does it impact upon
life. Applying design for the environment principles results in innovative the environment?
products and solutions that are focused on helping customers
achieve their own environmental goals. IB: Increased mobility reduces hardware and the need to travel. Both
of these can have a significant impact on the environment. Previously
HP’s approach is to implement products and solutions on its own mobile and wireless IT on a business scale were a less-than-
operations. For example, consolidating the HP data centre using the attractive option: deployment of mobile devices was challenging, the
latest cooling and virtualisation technologies, and streamlining printing distribution of new applications and updates was complex, support
using managed print services. for mobile devices was expensive and mobile devices can pose
a significant security risk. However HP’s Enterprise Mobility Suite
SB: Green is an interesting phrase and means many different tackles these issues making them a more attractive prospect for
things to different people. Fundamentally green is about using finite large business enterprises. Through implementing a more mobile IT
resources in the most effective way possible and minimising impact solution, energy and resource use can be cut so a business can
on the environment. It’s key to understanding the impact of everything reduce its environmental footprint.
we do, embedding it into the business processes of the organisation.
Just branding a product green doesn’t make much of an impact on AV: In my opinion, rather marginal.
the problem. Without taking this holistic approach it is unlikely that
a sustainable and energy efficient strategy can be developed and Question: SAAS (Software As A Service) is another term
maintained. that is receiving a great deal of attention for potential green
benefits; do you see it becoming mainstream over the next
AV: First measure, then analyse and find the biggest pockets for few years?
improvement and ROI, only then implement it.
SB: The use of SAAS has already begun and the usage will increase
Question: Some industry onlookers estimate that data over time, to meet peak requirements. Where highly utilised, energy
centres are taking up to 40 per cent of all IT spending. Do efficient servers can be used to provide software service to a large
you believe the related green innovations are keeping pace number of users, hence sharing workload and negating the need for
with this investment? many under utilised individual servers. The use of shared services
within companion industries will also serve to increase the use of the
IB: The data centre is an area where HP has seen substantial green SAAS model and the associated benefits.
innovation recently, reflecting the importance that customers place
on energy efficiency in the data centre. Dynamic smart cooling AV: I think the claim is questionable.
solutions in data centres reduce the cost of cooling by 25-40 per
cent, while reducing CO2 emissions by intelligently re-tuning the air Question: Thin clients and hosted desktops solutions are
conditioning output in response to server demand, thus supporting both attracting attention because of their reported green
a higher operating temperature. Additionally, companies are seeking benefits. Can you enlighten us a little more?
to address the ever-growing complexity and energy demands of their
computing environments. By consolidating applications, hardware IB: Thin client desktops provide an efficient hardware solution
and virtualising the remaining systems, they provide a considerably connecting over a network to a server where all processing and
more efficient set up. Combined with intelligent power distribution and storage takes place. There is little duplication of applications,
efficient architectures such as Blade servers, energy and resource hardware, and processing, thus using less energy and resource
use can be further reduced. investment and making them a greener solution. Some of the biggest
benefits of thin client solutions are seen in overall cost savings and
HP has considerable experience implementing business consolidation increased productivity. According to Zona Research, thin client Total
solutions. HP Consolidation solutions simplify, standardise and Cost of Ownership savings have been measured as high as 80 per
reduce the number of data centres, infrastructure (including hardware, cent less maintenance per year, 25 per cent capital cost savings, 34
networking and storage) and applications that make up the technology per cent less in maintenance, 23 per cent less to operate and a 25
environment. This provides efficient resource management to cut per cent productivity increase.
energy use, cost and emissions.
Hosted desktops share the base server operating system among many
SB: Together with traditional drivers for IT innovation such as security, users, providing a high degree of sharing of system resources. Hardware
availability, resilience, etc, the demand for energy efficient solutions is and power investment can be reduced this way, and they are a low cost,
increasing. Vendors are making claim and counter claim on the energy secure, and centralised solution for the IT organization to manage.
efficiency of their servers and everyone in the industry knows that
virtualisation of servers in the data centre is a key part of the answer. Both thin clients and hosted desktops can create a more efficient
network set up, with lower investments in energy and resources, thus
However, how the systems are being used plays a more important providing a greener solution.
role than the absolute energy efficiency of a specific IT product.
3For example, EXCLUSIVEan x86 server running at 5 per cent utilisation is not SB: When considering how energy is consumed in an office
an efficient
ROUNDT
use of energy!
ABLE
‘Greenness’ is a factor of the productive environment and the efficiency of how the energy is consumed,
workload completed for the energy used. desk top devices such as PCs and laptops consume as much as
55 | ecoexecutive
GREENIT ROUNDTABLE.indd 55 18/4/08 16:23:54
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101