INTRODUCTION

The physical and digital worlds move on energy and when the cost of electricity rises, many dynamics come into play. Organizations faced with high energy prices may be forced to make short-term cost-cutting decisions that move them away from their goal and if they aren’t careful, can even permanently impede their ability to attain their goal.

Information technology (IT) occupies an interesting position in organizations. On one hand, it is an energy consumer and on the other, it can help organizations achieve objectives related to minimizing energy expenditures.

With the current public spotlight on the effects of global warming and climatic change, governments will increase their scrutiny of activities that release substantial amounts of greenhouse gases (GHG) into the environment.

Given the skyrocketing demands for electricity from data centers and the resulting GHG emissions from electrical utilities trying to supply power to meet those demands, it is very likely that data centers will be regulated in some form in the future.

This threat of regulation presents a challenge for organizations because they consume a tremendous amount of energy – 61 billion kilowatt hours (kWh) in 2006¹. This energy comes from many sources but most notably coal fired power plants that release carbon dioxide (CO₂) into the environment. Given the projected growth rate, if left unchecked, 10 new power plants would be needed by 2010 to meet the demands of data centers. This will result in data centers actually surpassing airlines in the amount of GHG released due to the increased power generation required².

There will be pressures for change coming from many different directions. Inside organizations, management will demand that IT control costs while delivering the same level of value, or even greater. Power companies are going to refuse to provide additional power to data centers because they simply do not have the means to do so. Governments will introduce regulations to curb GHG emissions and likely include specific provisions for IT and data centers. Lastly, there is likely to be public resentment and brand damage arising from perceptions of organizations that consume large amounts of electricity.

A perfect storm that can derail organizational goals has arisen in the form of rising energy costs, increasing demands for power, financial pressures, climatic change and the threat of increased governmental regulation. This combination of forces hasn’t confronted organizations or their IT departments ever before.

To effectively and efficiently respond to this situation, while continuing their dual mission of value creation and value protection, organizations must implement proper governance around their “greening” activities and, germane to this book, the actions of IT.

As pressures mount to both protect the environment while simultaneously pursuing the goals of the organization, boards will need to monitor how risks are being managed.

Due to the current environment, this book will focus primarily on using the Green IT process in the data center for managing energy demands, but the process’ scope can be expanded to manage green requirements within IT and how IT provides services to the rest of the organization.

¹ “Report to Congress on Server and Data Center Energy Efficiency: Public Law 109-431”,US Environmental Protection Agency, www.energystar.gov/ia/partners/prod development/downloads/EPA Datacenter Report Congress Final1.pdf.

²  Revolutionizing Data Center Efficiency–McKinsey/Institute Report Released”, Will Forrest, Podcast and PowerPoint at the Uptime Institute, http://www.uptimeinstitute.org.