Greening of Google

Google isn't aiming to be carbon-neutral, at least today. With the company growing 60 per cent to 70 per cent a year, "we can't hold our energy use flat for now," says Bill Weihl, head of Google's energy strategy.

Google has measured its entire carbon footprint, including the portions of the supply chain run by third parties, he says. The next step will be to choose products based on how much energy they use.

"The motivation for us really is around sustainability, from the view of having an economy 50 years from now that we can do business in," Weihl says.

An IT department can act as a central communication point to build cultural change within an organization, says John Hengeveld, director of the server products group at Intel.

One challenge is that "eco-projects" are rarely done strictly because of their merits, says Mark Monroe, director of sustainable computing at Sun. Opportunities to replace technologies with ones that are more efficient typically are precipitated by events having little or nothing to do with environmental strategy, he says.

"To make these eco-decisions, you have to be ready and in the right place," Monroe says.

Tips for going green

Author and consultant Winston offered IT departments a number of tips to improve efficiency, including these:

-- Measure IT energy-spending separately.

-- Use power-management software.

-- Buy green, efficient computers, and tell vendors that you care about efficiency and use of toxic materials.

-- Limit how much power and cooling you provide, to force yourself to use it more efficiently.

-- Prepare for a product's end of life, and take responsibility for its disposal or recycling.

-- Develop the business case for energy efficiency, looking at system and life-cycle costs.

-- Buy green power.

-- Set efficiency targets, then upgrade or get rid of equipment to eliminate underutilized and inefficient machines.

-- Add the power bill to the CIO's budget.

Companies that don't accept the need to reduce greenhouse emissions will have to answer to a diverse set of stakeholders, including investors, rule-makers, watchdogs, consumers, and the media, Winston says. But there is money to be made by reducing energy use and developing innovative new products to meet these environmental needs. Ethernet switches, for example, increasingly are going green.

"The business community doesn't really get going unless there is a profit motive. And there is," Winston says. "There is no choice anymore. The world is going green. Companies are going green. There's no going back."