Power down your IT for the weekend, help a wounded warrior

Here's something easy for your to-do list on Friday, August 27: Pledge to shut down your computer, monitor and printer as part of Power IT Down day. Not only could you save some power for you or your organization, but you could help inspire a $45,000 donation to the Wounded Warrior Project by Citrix, Hewlett-Packard, Intel and public sector technology integrator GTSI.

The estimated energy savings for shutting down your computer, monitor and printer at the end of each day is about 13 kilowatt hours per person overnight. But since this particular shut-down day falls on a Friday and the equipment will be off all weekend, Citrix public sector executive Tom Simmons figures that the savings will be more like 55 kilowatt hours per person for the entire weekend.

This is the third annual Power IT down day, and the group's goal is to inspire 6,100 people to shut down their personal computers. Right now, close to 3,300 people have registered. Last year, the total participants were about 5,600 (the goal was 5,000).

The effort started as a public sector project, Simmons says, because Washington, D.C., tends to be darn hot in August. But you don't have to be a government employee to sign up: ANYONE can register. It goes without saying that the ultimate goal is to get people thinking about doing this EVERY day.