Green Computing : To reduce the
Negative Impacts of Technology
on the Environment
Dr.D.Shanthi
Prof .& Head - CSE
PSNACET, Dindigul
Presentation Outline
Introduction
Green Computing / IT
Why Green Computing?
Roads to Green Computing
Green Computing Initiatives
Strategies to Implement Green
Computing
Challenges
Conclusion
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“In the long term, economic sustainability
depends on
ecological sustainability.“
3
Cree Indian Prophecy
Environment Today
It is becoming widely understood that
the way in which we are behaving as a
society is environmentally unsustainable
causing irreparable damage to our planet
Global warming and environmental
changes have become problematic
issues with governments, corporations
and therefore all are seeking out new
ways to green up.
Introduction
 “Green” has become a popular term for describing things
that are good for the environment, generally healthful and,
more recently, economically sensible.
 Environmental and Energy conservation issues are now the
talk of the day in the global business arena in recent years.
 The driving force behind this change comes from




the ever growing business computing needs,
fast growing burden of energy cost,
growing awareness of global warming issues,
and increasing sense of national energy security
 The technology community, specifically computer users,
have popularized the term “Green Computing,”.
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What is Green Computing/IT?
New Paradigm
of designing the
Computer systems
Which considers
Processing
Performance
&
also the energy
efficiency
Refers to
environmentally
sustainable
computing
The study and practice of designing, manufacturing, using,
and disposing of computers, servers, and associated subsystems
such as monitors, printers, storage devices, and
networking communications Systems efficiently and effectively
with minimal or no impact on the environment.
6
Contd..
 The goals are to reduce the use of hazardous materials,
maximize energy efficiency during the product's lifetime,
and promote recyclability or biodegradability of defunct
products and factory waste.
 It also strives to achieve economic viability and improved
system performance and use, while abiding by our social
and ethical responsibilities.
 GC includes
 the dimensions of environmental sustainability,
 the economics of energy efficiency,
 and the total cost of ownership, which includes the cost
of disposal and recycling.
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Green Computing Why?



The
global
information
and 
communications technology (ICT) industry
accounts for approximately 2 percent of 
global carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, a
figure equivalent to aviation, according to
a estimate by Gartner, Inc. Despite the
overall environmental value of IT, Gartner
believes this is unsustainable. (Gartner,
2007).
As we know that the IT industry has long
been a significant contributor to global
warming, but green computing is a strong
and growing trend that seeks to reverse
that impact.
Green computing is the utmost
requirement to protect environment 
and
save
energy
along
with
operational
expenses
in
today's 
increasingly competitive world.
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To reduce the the consumption of
power in H/W design.
Growing
public
environmental
awareness
Increasing impacts on environmental
and human health.
Corporate social responsibility.
Roads to Green Computing
 Green Use
Four
domains
of
Green
Computing
 Green Design
 Green
Manufacturing
 Green Disposal
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Contd..
 Green use is all about reducing the energy consumption
associated with the computing resources and use them in
an environmentally sound manner.
 Green
Design — designing energy-efficient and
environmentally sound components, computers, servers,
cooling equipment, and data centers .
 Green
Manufacturing — manufacturing electronic
components, computers, and other associated subsystems
with minimal impact on the environment
 Green disposal deals with the issues of refurbishing and
recycling old computers and electronic equipment.
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Leading Edge Forum : Seeing the whole energy
picture
IT Usage ~ 2%
Electricity
Emissions
Recycling
Chemicals
Water
IT Production ~ 4%
Digital
GNP
Reduced
Transportation
Smart
Products
IT Application >90%
Building
Controls
Real-time
Measurement
Sustainability and Green IT?
A pile of electronic waste on a roadside
in Guiyu, China
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Electronic waste in Guangdong, China As much a
s 4,000 tonnes of toxic e-waste are discarded
every hour. Vast amounts are routinely and oft
en illegally shipped as waste from Europe, USA
and Japan to places where unprotected worker
s recover parts and materials.
Green Computing Initiatives
 Computer science plays a crucial role in the research, teaching,
and promotion of Green Computing techniques.
 As part of a green strategy, IT organizations should assess which
tech manufacturers have taken an environmentally conscious
approach in their product design and are working to reduce their
carbon footprint in their manufacturing processes.
 Such practices include the implementation of energy-efficient
central processing units (CPUs), servers and peripherals as well as
reduced resource consumption and proper disposal of electronic
waste (e-waste).
 Enterprise Management Associates (EMA) recommends businesses
to implement a green computing solution not only to contribute to
the global environmental movement, but also to decrease
operating
expenses
and
boost
profitability.
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Contd..
 Lenovo has developed new energy-efficient LCD monitors
that reduce the number of lamps from four to two.
 Xerox, for its part, has developed green printers that use
solid ink, which produce less waste because IT
administrators no longer have to dispose of toner
cartridges.
 Hewlett-Packard’s DeskJet D2545 printer relies heavily on
recycled materials, notes .
 IBM is significantly expanding the scope of Project Big
Green to allow clients to address a much broader portion of
the IT infrastructure, not only in the data center but beyond
its walls.
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Contd..
 Recycled plastics account for 83 percent of the printer’s
total plastic weight, and it uses ink cartridges molded from
recycled plastic resins. The printer is also Energy Star
certified and comes in 100 percent recyclable packaging.
 Some tech manufacturers are trying to make their
packaging 100 percent recyclable.
 Acer, for example, is reducing its use of plastic foam.
Acer’s Aspire Netbooks ship primarily in cardboard
packaging.
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Sun Micro System survey
 According to a survey conducted
by Sun Microsystems on Green
IT, there were different aspects
that organizations wish to achieve
via Green IT implementation.
 The top of the charts were
reduction of power consumption
and lowering of costs.
 While
environmental
concern
plays an important role in
implementing Green IT, improved
system performance and space
settings also act as potential
reasons
for
Green
IT
implementation.
Power
 Laser printers use a
significant
amount
of
energy while printing
 LCD monitors use 40%
less
energy
than
equivalent-sized CRTs
 Desktop
power
usage
appears to increase by 35
-45% every two years
 Peripherals can account
for 10% or more of a
desktop’s energy usage
Results of measuring power consumption for different power modes
using these two computers are shown in Figure.
Going Green….
 According to the survey, IT executives cite
social responsibility (38 percent) and
reducing operational costs (37 percent) as
primary drivers for greening their IT
operations.
 This survey also unveiled that many
corporations are currently implementing
similar green IT initiatives.
 The top four green IT initiatives are
common throughout many industries; each
of them would be relatively
 straightforward—and ultimately profitable—
to execute.
 These four most common programs are
 depicted in the diagram.
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Tips for Initiating Green Strategy
 Review your document on the screen instead of printing a draft. If you
must print a draft, use the blank back side of used sheets. It may be
possible to keep once-used paper in an extra tray in your printer.
 Print in Economic mode when you can this saves toner by printing lighter
on paper.
 Buy refurbished ink cartridges and toner when possible
 Print duplex this saves paper.
 Don’t use screensavers.
 Only buy a monitor as large as you really need. Although a large monitor
might seem more attractive, you should remember that a 19-inch monitor
uses 40% more energy than a 17-inch monitor. Also, the higher the
resolution you buy, it needs more energy.
 Again, the biggest thing is turning off all equipment when you leave for
the day computers, monitors, copiers, printers, fax machines, etc.
 Change your default margins in MS Word—The current margin default
settings of 1.25" left/right and 1" top/bottom "eat up" a lot of usable
document space.
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Strategies which help in implementation of
Green Computing
 Using Virtualization to Reduce Numbers of Servers
Virtualization is the technology, which allows companies’
business application to be managed by independent host’s
hardware.
 Adopting this strategy does not mean a move away from
the logical model, only the physical model. Where servers
are typically underutilized, virtualization can be used to
carve up a single physical machine into a number of virtual
servers.
 From a green perspective the net result is normally a
substantial reduced in power and air conditioning
requirements saving energy, money and thus reducing the
carbon footprint of the server estate.
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 It allows companies of all sizes to cut costs, improve IT
services and manage risk.
 Virtualization is given credit for a whole array of energy and
emission saving outcomes.
 Virtualization, it can be argued, is largely responsible for
cloud computing direct and indirect impacts on emissions of
green house gasses but not for its systemic impacts.
According to Gartner, Virtualization will be the highest-impact
trend changing infrastructure and operations through 2012.
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How can SE counteract threats to the environment?Green Software Engineering
 Software engineering is the application of a systematic,
disciplined, quantifiable approach to the development, operation,
and maintenance of software…
+
To counteract the threats to the environment
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Algorithmic efficiency
 The efficiency of algorithms has an impact on the amount
of computer resources required for any given computing
function and there are many efficiency trade-offs in writing
programs.
 As computers have become more numerous and the cost of
hardware has declined relative to the cost of energy, the
energy efficiency and environmental impact of computing
systems and programs has received increased attention.
 Algorithms can also be used to route data to data centers
where electricity is less expensive.
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On Demand Computing
 By adopting this solution, companies can demand computing
resources like CPU, applications bandwidth and storage ondemand basis that decrease the amount of wasted energy.
Utility Computing
 It is a type of service that works on pay-as-per-usage basis. It
provides flexible plans for computing usage and improves
productivity.
 Through these services, firms can check their energy expenditures
and bring their costs down.
Service Oriented Architecture
 It consolidates business processes, by combining various business
management services.
 Various firms adopt SOA to lower their costs and increase
efficiency via speed and security for web applications.
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Grid computing:
The demonstration of the under-utilization of present
computing resources acted as a strong motivating factor in favori
ng the intention to implement Grid computing.
It is a cost effective way to acquire computer resources.
The apps can combine geographically dispersed resources to
process a large amount of data, without consuming large
amounts of energy.
Cloud Computing
Now that cloud computing has been defined, and hopefully its
disruptive impact as potential societal changer has been highli
ghted, the question of how ‘Green’ cloud computing is can be a
ddressed.
This technology allows for much more efficient computing by
centralizing storage, memory, processing and bandwidth.
Cloud computing potency as a Green IT initiative is often attri
buted to one single underlying enabling technology - that of Vir
tualization.
Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IAAS),
Platform-as-a-Service (PAAS) and
Software-as-a-Service (SAAS).
Green Data Centre
A green data centre is a repository for the storage, management,
and dissemination of data in which the mechanical, lighting, electri
cal and computer systems are designed for maximum energy effici
ency and minimum environmental impact.
The construction and operation of a green data centre includes ad
vanced technologies and strategies.
The world of data and communications is swiftly moving in the dir
ection of eco-friendly and greener data centers.
Eco awareness along with corporate being held accountable has
made it more than need pay attention to such initiatives like
•
•
•
•
Design
Design
Design
Design
must
must
must
must
be
be
be
be
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simple.
scalable.
modular.
flexible.
Blackle Search Engine
 Blackle is a search-engine site powered by Google
Search. Blackle came into being based on the concept
that when a computer screen is white, presenting an
empty word page or the Google home page, your
computer consumes 74W.
 When the screen is black it consumes only 59W. Based
on this theory if everyone switched from Google to
Blackle, mother earth would save 750MW each year.
This was a really good implementation of Green
Computing.
Thin Client Pilot
The thin client computer architecture
relies on the network to be the
computer. The root of the system is the
server, which provides all of the
processing power and storage. Each user
needs only a monitor/terminal (a thin
client).
•In addition to the business benefits, this
system
can
reduce
the
overall
environmental footprint of a desktop by
as much as 75%
(Source: Sun Microsystems: Sustainable Computing).
Zonbu Computer:
 Zonbu is a new, very energy efficient PC. The Zonbu
consumes just one third of the power of a typical light
bulb.
 The device runs the Linux operating system using a1.2
gigahertz processor and 512 meg of RAM. It also
contains no moving parts, and does even contain a fan.
Challenges
 The major problem was educating the stakeholders
regarding the environmental impact of computers.
 Also, one drawback with the Green project is that one
cannot demonstrate immediate results.
 Also, it involved studies to prove that the present
infrastructure had inefficiencies and that the environmental
impact of computers was potential.
 Again replacement of heavy and costly devices like printers
and processors. Hence, an effective method of replacement
and environmental friendly disposal of such systems had to
be worked upon.
Going Awareness in Education
 A study by Sendall (2010) identified a surprising “lack”
of
green
IT/IS/computing
and/or
sustainability
curriculum initiatives in institutions of higher education.
 Computer science departments can lead by example to
encourage students and faculty to learn more about
Green Computing.
 By instituting one or more green practice or policy for
labs, classes or offices, students and faculty will gain
practical experience and knowledge.
 The result may be that some students and faculty will
decide to pursue further learning about or application of
Green Computing in their classes or research labs.
So … Now
 Green computing is the absolute requirement to take care
of environment and save energy along with operational
expenses in today's increasingly competitive world.
 The focus of computation has shifted to efficient power
consumption, less computations by improving Algorithmic
efficiency and alternative energy sources.
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Conclusion
 The beauty of pursuing a green IT/computing strategy
is its multifaceted benefits.
 Green computing is not about going out and designing
biodegradable packaging for products.
 Now the time came to think about the efficiently use of
computers and the resources which are non renewable.
 It opens a new window for the new entrepreneur for
harvesting with E-waste material and scrap computers.
Contd..
 Consolidating the data center, purchasing more energyefficient equipment and deploying applications such as
video conferencing and document management improve
worker productivity, cut energy consumption and help save
money while protecting the environment.
 Combine all the benefits, and ultimately, they all help
government serve its citizens better.
 There’s no question that going green is trendy these days.
But, for local, state and government IT leaders, it’s also
smart and it provides real return on investment.
 Change is the only constant thing in this world.
Thank you
for your
attention !!!
Power Flower PC is a complete computer that was listed in the
top five final entries at the Design Regeneration competition.
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