Quocirca and the Environment

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-	[[Category:Copied 2007 week 29]]	+	==In the Press==
-	=How Green is my V-word?=	+
-	==MI Summary==	+
-	[[Category:Not yet summarised by MI]]	+	* [[Blue-Sky Green? (6-Nov-07)]]
-	==Text of Article==	+	* [[IT shouldn't cop all the blame for wrecking environment (10-Sep-07)]]
		+	* [[It's not easy being Green (7-Aug-07)]]
		+	* [[How Green is my V-word? (17-Jul-07)]]
-	Source: [http://www.it-director.com/business/costs/content.php?cid=9654 IT-Director.com]	+	==Summaries==
-	Dennis Szubert, Principal Analyst, Quocirca	+	{{Cop sep-07}}
-		+	{{Easy Aug-07}}
-	Published: 17th July 2007	+
-		+
-	No, not "valley" as in John Ford's 1941 classic movie based on Richard Llewellyn's 1939 best-seller about a close-knit, hard-working Welsh coal-mining family at the turn of the twentieth century. Nor "vampires" as in the somewhat less classic episode from the "Masters of Horror" TV series that introduced the "V- word" concept. It's not even the euphemism increasingly being used to avoid saying "Vietnam" when analysing current events in Iraq.	+
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-	No, we are referring to that current IT hero, Mr Virtualisation and, in particular, to his pairing with that latest industry poster-child, Ms Green Computing. Is this a celebrity couple to match the Beckhams, now that they have left for the sunnier climes of LA?	+
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-	Here is the basic premise; virtualisation means consolidation and increased utilisation, and hence less servers. Fewer servers mean less power, which in turn means less CO2, thus saving the planet. Simple.	+
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-	Or is it? I have heard it said, "Yes, you have fewer servers in a virtualised environment, but each one of those servers is more heavily utilised. Because they are doing more work their power consumption goes up. What you gain on the swings you lose on the roundabouts. The net gain is zero".	+
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-	Who is right? Let's look at it in more detail. Say you virtualised and consolidated four identical servers that are 20% utilised, into one physical server. That server is now 80% utilised. Making the somewhat simplistic assumption that power usage ramps linearly with utilisation means power consumption will also increase from 20% of the maximum possible to 80%. But the processors are not the biggest users of the power drawn by a server—according to IBM only 30% gets used by the processors; the other 70% is used-up by the power-supply, fans, disks, memory etc.	+
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-	So the increase from 20% to 80% actually represents 60% of a slice that is only 30% of the overall pie; the total server power draw increases by 18%. In return for this modest increase you have removed three complete servers from the data centre, and overall power consumption has gone down from 4 "original server units" to 1.18—a pretty hefty 70% saving.	+
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-	Of course this is somewhat simplistic—the fans and the power supplies will have to work a bit harder because of the extra power drawn by the processors—but it still represents a significant saving when compared to what you will get from any new power saving hardware features. Power consumption improvements in the processor, disks, power supply and cooling areas tend to be incremental. When added together they do become more significant, but are still not anything like the step change that you may expect to see from virtualisation.	+
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-	Of course virtualisation is not a panacea for all power and cooling problems. For a start not all servers virtualise well, especially those with I/O-intensive workloads like database servers. And with 65% of the power coming into in a typical data centre going on stuff other than the IT workload (such as air conditioning), power savings at the server may not be directly reflected in the overall data centre electricity bill. Unless your cooling system is sophisticated enough you may just end-up blowing cold air over the three quarters of floor-space that are now empty.	+
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-	So what is the lesson? Establishing exactly what power savings you are going to get from an infrastructure virtualisation project is not straightforward (hence the title), but virtualisation will almost certainly be the most important step you take in this area. It seems slightly ironic that a software solution (virtualisation) may play the largest part in solving what is essentially a hardware problem.	+
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-	Obviously you will not only be saving the planet, but also money. With the total power costs over the lifetime of a server currently estimated as being in the region of 50% of the hardware costs, self-interest may play as big a part here as enlightened altruism. And you get to feel good about yourselves at the same time, never mind the PR mileage. It is not often that an economic force (greed) coincides with the common good (or at least looking good); when they do—watch out for an unstoppable bandwagon. Better still—jump aboard.	+

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Current revision as of 10:38, 6 November 2007

Contents 1 In the Press 2 Summaries 2.1 Full article: IT shouldn't cop all the blame for wrecking environment (10-Sep-07) 2.2 Full article: It's not easy being Green (7-Aug-07)

In the Press

• Blue-Sky Green? (6-Nov-07)
• IT shouldn't cop all the blame for wrecking environment (10-Sep-07)
• It's not easy being Green (7-Aug-07)
• How Green is my V-word? (17-Jul-07)

Summaries

Full article: IT shouldn't cop all the blame for wrecking environment (10-Sep-07)

The IT industry is in danger of becoming an unnecessary apologist for environmental woes caused by the equipment it sells.

A lot of the bad press focuses on data centres and, indeed, these should be the starting point for any initiative to green the use of IT by businesses.

The way in which the buildings, energy supply, cooling equipment, hardware and software associated with data centres can be adapted to improve energy efficiency are well recorded.

For many businesses the majority of energy consumed by IT will not be in the data centres, but in the numerous business locations it is there to serve. Of course a lot of kit needs to stay near the point of use, such as monitors, printers and telephones. But moving branch servers into data centres, introducing thin-client computing where practical and serving remote users with web-enabled applications all have a part to play in reducing the “office-IT factor”.

Some might point to a potential downside in that data centres can become a single point of failure for applications that were once widely distributed. But this can be mitigated through good management and failover facilities.

This is where the IT industry needs to get its message across better. Many IT applications can drive reductions in energy usage elsewhere in the business, for instance, reducing transport requirements and better buildings management.

If it can be shown that executives are flying fewer miles, that employees’ car mileage claims are reducing, that supply chains really are more efficient and the buildings are cooled and heated more effectively though the use of IT, then genuine claims can be made that this is helping to reduce the total carbon footprint of a business.

Full article: It's not easy being Green (7-Aug-07)

This is an overview article that covers many topic: data centre consolidation, wind and wave power, energy losses in transmisson, nuclear energy, CHP etc.

• Taking power from green energy suppliers seems reasonable—but what happens if all organisations and homes did this? There is nowhere near enough green power being produced.
• The greenest means of generating centralised power may yet appear to be nuclear—provided you are willing to disassociate the long term green costs of decommissioning from those of the actual power.
• Limits in the basic efficiencies of turning raw materials to electricity mean 60 per cent of possible energy is already lost before we get any electricity out of a power station that uses fossil fuels.
• The National Grid leads to further losses of nearly 8% of the remaining power through resistive heat dissipation, and further inefficiencies at substations and distribution to local points of usage account for yet more waste.
• Finally we get losses due to the inefficiencies of the electrical appliances themselves.
• Around 70% of energy having been lost before we get to use it, and we then waste more ourselves.
• IT is estimated to use 5% of all power and targets are set to bring this down to 4%.
• Heat generated from the data centre could be used elsewhere in the building, for example to heat or pre-heat water.
• If we could bring the power generation closer to the point of use, we could utilise the heat generated in the creation of electricity within the building's Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning requirements. Commonly known as combined heat and power (CHP), such units were considered during the 1990s but haven't made much impact as power utilities have chosen to go with the lower maintenance and running costs of centralised power plant.
• The transmission of gas has also become more efficient over time, with low losses. Gas powered CHP units can have overall efficiencies greater than 75 per cent, so we are more than doubling the base efficiency compared to large centralised electricity generation with no heat recovery.
• Another option is for businesses to run at a fixed load and sell excess electricity and heat to the National Grid and local community (a concept known as Community CHP, or CCHP). The solution therefore not only creates greener, more efficient electricity but removes or cuts heating costs and can provide revenues for organisations to boot.