Green Approach to Data Centers ‘Gaining Ground’

The proportion of IT professionals that say green initiatives are a key reason behind their data center consolidation efforts has risen from 34 percent in 2010 to 43 percent in 2011, according to research by technology firm CDW.

In the 2012 Energy Efficient IT Report, some 54 percent of respondents said they have or are developing programs to manage power demand in their data centers. Of those organizations that have programs, 75 percent have reduced their IT energy costs.

On average, survey respondents reported that 32 percent of their data center purchasing in the last three months can be classified as green, defined as energy efficient, water efficient, bio-based, environmentally preferable or non-ozone depleting, according to the survey.

Survey respondents report that the energy efficient technologies and solutions implemented most often are as follows: virtualized servers or storage (65 percent); server consolidation (60 percent); low-power/low-wattage processors (46 percent); Energy Star qualifying devices (44 percent); power-efficient networking equipment (31 percent); and energy-efficient/load-shedding uninterruptible power supplies (28 percent).

CDW described “cloud” computing – a big trend in data center energy management – as a possible “game changer” for energy efficient IT. Some 62 percent of respondents said they agree that cloud computing is an energy-efficient approach to data center consolidation, up from 47 percent in 2010.

In March, Berkeley Entrepreneurs Forum discussed energy-efficient technology developments for data centers including such initiatives as cloud computing. The forum can be watched here.