Research reminder: The need to control IT electricity use isn't confined to the data center

By | December 23, 2008, 2:28pm PST

Data alert: Forrester Research has published charts from a new survey this month reporting that technology OUTSIDE the data center uses more electricity than the stuff that lives inside. The findings are part of the research firm’s regular Enterprise and SMB Hardware Survey cycle, which it conducts on a quarterly basis, and tapped the opinions of 308 decision-makers from North America and Europe.

These companies reported that technology outside the data center such as PCs, monitors and printers typically accounts for 55 percent of the IT electricity use in their company, compared with 45 percent for the server and network infrastructure inside. Forrester didn’t say specifically say how it defined “IT outside the data center” in its survey, so the number MIGHT also include office equipment such as copiers.

Not surprisingly, companies from the telecommunications and utility sector tended to use more electricity in their data centers than other industries. On average, these businesses reported that their data centers accounted for about 32 percent of the TOTAL electricity use at their company, as opposed to business services firms (22 percent) or manufacturers (22 percent).

Finance and insurance companies, which have tons of printers lying around to create gazillion reports, reported that technology outside the data center accounted for about 33 percent of total electricity usages. That was a few points higher than for any of the other industries.

From a geographic standpoint, European companies used less electricity in their data centers than North American ones, according to the Forrester research. Ditto for stuff outside the data center. There was very little difference in usage when it came to company size.

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Heather Clancy is an award-winning business journalist with a passion for green technology and corporate sustainability issues.

Disclosure

Heather Clancy

Writing publicly about what the high-tech industry is actually doing to help itself and the world get greener or more sustainable is one way I figure I can contribute more meaningfully to said effort. I am also a big OMG-kind-of-fan of smart leadership, which is why the goodly folks who publish this blog let me go on about this topic and why I am always on the hunt for forward-looking business management ideas.

My daily writing is focused on looking for topics for my blogs, GreenTech Pastures and Business Brains. I also write often about emerging technology trends such as mobile computing, unified communications and cloud computing. Occasionally, I will pop up at an industry conference in some sort of speaking capacity. In cases where a speaking engagement involves a sponsor that may be covered in this blog, that fact will be disclosed in coverage as appropriate.

My corporate writing work usually consists of crafting research white papers about some aspect of technology. In the event that my commentary (in written, audio or video form) mentions a company for which I have provided consulting advice, I will disclose that fact. However, there is no connection between these projects and the topics that I am covering in my blog.

Biography

Heather Clancy

Heather Clancy is an award-winning business journalist with a passion for green technology and corporate sustainability issues. Her articles have appeared in Entrepreneur, Fortune Small Business, The International Herald Tribune and The New York Times. In a past corporate life, Heather was editor of Computer Reseller News, where she was a featured speaker about everything from software as a service to IT security to mobile computing.

Heather started her journalism life as a business writer with United Press International in New York. She holds a B.A. in English literature from McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, and has a thing for Lewis Carroll.

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Call me old fashoned....
Bill4 24th Dec 2008
....but the definition of "technology" that I am most familiar with goes like this: "technology: the practical application of science to commerce or industry."

Computer do-dads are assuredly technology related, but defining them as technology (like computer do-dad people tend to do) is excessively language revisionist. I'm a chemical technologist here.

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