Databus Issue: 2009 3 07/13/2009
Green Leadership
Rich Kaestner Project DirectorIn Times of Economic Stress
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Schools across the country, and particularly in California, are focused on dealing with unprecedented budget cuts. These are scary times, but this is also a time of opportunity; an opportunity to focus on many measures to tighten computer and network operations to drive efficiencies and implement streamlined support, infrastructure and related tools.
Utilities (gas, power, phone) are probably the second largest expense in your district, and office equipment (primarily computers, servers, storage and network equipment) make up about 25% of that expense. Other than changing thermostats the business office feels it has little control over utility bills; and because the utility bills are not part of the IT budget, this area of potentially big savings continues to sit on the IT department’s back burner in most schools.
Green Computing is an opportunity for the school or district technology leader to take the lead in working with the business office to save money, perhaps gaining a bit of IT budget relief in return, while leading the charge for a greener institution.
Saving Money with Green Computing
Green computing consists of responsible computer purchase and disposal, reduced energy use by computers, and using computers to reduce waste of non-renewable resources. The major cost savings from green computing result from efforts to reduce energy use by computers, and by using computers to measure and control building energy use.
When evaluating potential energy savings that can be realized within the computing infrastructure, it is important to understand or measure your current energy use, plan changes, implement changes and then measure progress. Both end user computing and datacenter equipment should be considered.
Measure: Before diving into energy saving measures, it is important to know your current baseline energy use of computers and related infrastructure; a sort of starting point for your energy conservation process. Hardware monitoring devices or sub-metering of datacenters and network managed energy use and control software for end user computers are ways to actually measure energy use. Alternatively, the Consortium for School Networking (CoSN) offers an energy usage calculator that does a reasonable job of estimating power use (www.cosn.org/greencomputing).
Plan: Reducing energy use by computers and related infrastructure entails a plan of action with estimated KwH and dollar savings. Once again the CoSN energy usage calculator is a good tool to help with these estimates. The energy savings can be looked at in two parts: end user computers and datacenter (or server closet).
End User: A turn-it-off policy is a first step for end users, whether or not you have automated and/or Energy Star features implemented. Beyond just turning off computers at night, user awareness should include turning off lights and turning off devices, including computers, at the power strip. All devices with power supplies should be plugged into power strips and power strips turned off when not in use. Additionally, most modern computers have the capability to standby then hibernate when not used for a period of time. These settings can be managed locally or by network-based programs, such as Faronics’ Power Save or Verdiem’s Surveyor products which also generate energy consumption and savings reports. Use of thin clients, such as offered by Citrix, or sharing a single PC among several keyboards, mice and displays, such as offered by NComputing, are other power saving approaches to end user computing. Replacing those old CRT displays (about 80 watts) with newer LCD models (about 30 watts) also helps.
Datacenter: Datacenters, which can use up to 100 times the power per square foot as classroom space, are good targets for reducing power consumption. In most cases, the servers, network equipment and storage devices use less than half of datacenter’s power; HVAC cooling, power supplies and other miscellaneous items use over fifty percent of the datacenter power. Considering that most servers are less than ten percent utilized, the datacenter generally offers a great opportunity for reductions in energy use. Server consolidation, using blade servers, and where application isolation is necessary, virtualization offer ways to reduce the number of servers along with related HVAC and power supply requirements. Likewise, migrating to fewer, larger-capacity storage drives generally reduces power requirements. A focus on controlling the flow of cold air in the datacenter may also reap benefits. Is it really necessary for the entire room to feel like a refrigerator, or can the cool air be directed to hot spots, such as processors?
Reduce Waste: Computers can also be used to reduce power consumption elsewhere. Areas worth investigating include computerized building climate controls and utility bill monitoring and management software, such as UtilityDirect from SchoolDude.
Saving natural resources and reducing carbon emissions while saving your school or district money is a win for everyone. And, during the current budget crisis, you may be able to negotiate for an energy use line-item in the IT budget or for a percent of the energy savings you can bring about with green computing.
Rich Kaestner is the Project Director for CoSN’s Green Computing Leadership Initiative. More information about CoSN can be found at www.cosn.org.
