Green Grid keeps Eye on Prize (9-Aug-07)
From Lauraibm
MI Summary
The Green Grid has recently outlined a road map for delivering a bounty of studies to aid data centre operators in wringing the most performance out of their facilities whilst using the least amount of energy possible. However, Gartner have critically commented that Green Grid has demonstrated no plans to overtly tackle broader environmental issues beyond the data centre.
In response to this Intel’s representative on the Green Grid board stated that the Grid are trying to keep their focus on solving tangible problems and making a difference that way. They want to be viewed as a technical resource for the IT industry and people working on legislation, they are not concerned about being a lobbying organisation. The Green Grid do acknowledge that there is a plethora of IT-related environmental issues to address, nevertheless the group is determined to remain focused on its primary objective of energy efficiency in the data centre.
Text of Article
Contrary to Gartner's opinion, The Green Grid should concentrate on datacenter efficiency rather than dabbling in politics
More than a year ago, a handful of high-tech companies sowed the seeds for the Green Grid, a group they envisioned would work toward developing industry-wide best practices, metrics, and technologies for improving datacenter energy efficiencies.
The idea took root, and last February, the fledgling organization broke through the soil into the public light.
Since that time, it has blossomed impressively, boasting more than 80 members ranging from hardware and software companies such as Intel, AMD, and Microsoft, to telecoms such as BT, to public utilities, including PG&E.
The organization has borne some tangible fruit, including three white papers on topics such as preliminary, high-level benchmarks as well as broad best practices. And just this week, it outlined for the public a rather ambitious road map for delivering a bounty of studies to aid datacenter operators in wringing the most performance out of their facilities while using the least amount of energy possible.
But as critically observed by Gartner in a recent report, the Green Grid has demonstrated no plans to overtly tackle broader environmental issues beyond the datacenter -- reducing e-waste, for example -- through means such as political lobbying.
Gartner presented its criticism of the Green Grid in a paper titled "The Green Grid: A Paler Shade of Green." While the paper is, in some ways, supportive of the Green Grid's efforts, the authors of the paper start off with this sentence:
"The charter of the Green Grid extends beyond power and cooling strategies to include dealing with broad environmental issues. However, much of the initial focus misses the greater opportunity to influence legislation and behavior for broader green issues."
Nowhere on the Green Grid's Web site do I see mention that one of its goals is to address "broader environmental issues," and it's certainly never come up in my various interactions with members of the group. Still, its members do acknowledge that there is, indeed, a plethora of IT-related environmental issues to address. However, the group is determined to remain focused on its primary objective: energy efficiency in the datacenter.
"In the green space, energy is the 800-pound gorilla. It translates directly to economic savings and greenhouse gas savings. Not that there are other important issues, but if you're looking at what to attack first, go to energy efficiency first," says Mark Monroe, a Green Grid board member who represents Sun.
Focusing on that issue is critical to getting the job done, asserts Jim Pappas, Intel's representative on the Green Grid board, who has worked on many successful groups to develop industry standards. "I understand Gartner's position. I don't necessarily agree with it," he says. "We're trying to keep our focus on solving tangible problems and making a difference that way. [That leads to] a much quicker path to demonstrable advancement in the industry."
The Green Grid's goals are very ambitious, and the fruits of its labor are extremely important for IT organizations and tech-reliant companies throughout the United States and beyond as they struggle with keeping energy costs down and datacenters humming. For Gartner to dismiss the group's focus, as it does in the report, as "simply power efficiency in the datacenter" is to demonstrate, in my view, a serious lack of understanding of and appreciation for just how serious the issue of energy efficiency is for companies, how complex the datacenter environment is, and how tricky it is to establish useful and meaningful green standards and benchmarks.
I certainly am not arguing that the consortium shouldn't have any interaction with the government; it does. For example, the Green Grid provided technical feedback to the EPA for its recently released study on server and datacenter efficiency.
But providing technical feedback is where the Green Grid wants to draw the line, notes Monroe. "The Green Grid wants to be viewed as a technical resource for the IT industry and people working on legislation. We're not going to be a lobbying organization, but rather a technical resource for those folks," he says.
As much as I respect Gartner, I have to agree that members of the Green Grid ought not don a PAC-like cap. There are other tech-oriented organizations out there that are pushing for eco-oriented legislation -- and there are some Green Grid members in their ranks.
But if the Green Grid is to effectively pursue its ambition of being an independent body for developing vendor-neutral recommendations on best practices, metrics, and technologies for all datacenter operators, the last thing it needs is to let itself be distracted -- or potential members and supporters to be put off -- by its dabbling in politics.
- Source: InfoWorld
