JISC’s Greening ICT Programme Rob Bristow Programme Manager – Green ICT 11 th March 2011 Online

Maximising Data Centre Efficiency – Bristol March 2011 Drivers for Green ICT ICT Energy and carbon emissions Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC) Funding council drivers Reduce costs Improve efficiency Enhance reputation New ways of working and new paradigms for teaching, learning, research and administration

Maximising Data Centre Efficiency – Bristol March 2011 The Problem 760,000 PCs 215,000 servers 147,000 networked printers 512,000 Mwh of electricity 275,000 tonnes of CO2 High costs - £116 million + in 2009 (Electricity HE & FE in UK) Picture: Josie Fraser Some rights reserved

Maximising Data Centre Efficiency – Bristol March 2011 Production Burdens A typical semiconductor facility: million gallons DI water million pounds of chemicals million kwh of electricity PC/LCD production - 1,000+ hazardous substances High energy materials tonnes of rock - for 1 gram of gold

Maximising Data Centre Efficiency – Bristol March 2011 The Opportunity Smarter systems, buildings and processes Re-think the campus and the curriculum De-materialisation, dis-aggregation and dis- intermediation HE as exemplar for low-carbon IT Green as driver for other efficiency gains ICT as cost versus ICT as opportunity

Maximising Data Centre Efficiency – Bristol March 2011 Data Centres and Server Rooms “the physical reality of modern campus CyberInfrastructure (CI) is a complex network of ad hoc and sub-optimal energy environments in departmental facilities” –Green Light project - UC - San Diego But demand is growing –Processing –Storage – Exabytes of data –E-Science EU Code of Conduct for Data Centres Picture: Josie Fraser Some rights reserved

Maximising Data Centre Efficiency – Bristol March 2011 The Desktop Still over 50% of ICT energy use in most institutions Thin client may not be best way to go –Balance back-end energy use with support costs, etc Powerdown solutions available –Commercial –Open source (late 2011 – JISC funded project)

Maximising Data Centre Efficiency – Bristol March 2011 Printing and Print Substitution “(Staff) printing is out of control” –Peter James –Often only measure is how much paper gets bought Tacking printing can raise difficult issues in some places Form a cross-functional team and team and get the users on board Roll out Multi-functional devices and cull desktop printers Enable power-saving modes and duplex printing by default 95% of energy associated with printing is the paper Look at print substitution and handheld devices

Maximising Data Centre Efficiency – Bristol March 2011 Procurement How to buy the best kit? 50% of energy use is in the manufacture and distribution – 50% in lifetime use Energy Star and EPEAT are useful yardsticks Energy Star Need for proper overview of total (environmental) cost of ownership TCO Certified for Monitors Disposal –Where is your kit ending up? More difficult making valid comparisons when it comes to servers and the like

Maximising Data Centre Efficiency – Bristol March 2011 The Programme Key objectives for the programme Greening the sector - attitudinal and behaviour change embedded across the sector New sustainable procurement paradigms Sustainability seen as key driver and yardstick for sector activities Harnessing of sector research activities Intended outputs from this programme  Substantive body of knowledge illuminating areas of uncertainty in respect to Green ICT  Exemplar projects providing leadership and best practice example Outcomes  Reduction of sector carbon footprint and associated energy costs  Increased capacity and expertise across the sector in sustainable ICT  Improved reputation of sector and UK as leaders in this area  Reduction in waste generated by ICT use

Maximising Data Centre Efficiency – Bristol March 2011 The story so far Suste-IT Project –Year long look at Green ICT in HE and FE –Report, briefing papers, case studies Carbon, Energy and Environmental Issues in Higher Education - Current Regulations and Schemes Virtual Servers for Efficient and Flexible IT Infrastructure Responsible Energy Costs in Higher and Further Education –Carbon Footprinting Tool –Thin/Thick Client tool –

Maximising Data Centre Efficiency – Bristol March 2011 Innovation Work Research & Exploration –Growing the knowledge base Technical Innovation –Joining things up, getting developers engaged in Green ICT Estates led strand –Building capacity –Projects led by Estates Directors Institutional Transformation –Re-thinking the campus and the curriculum Community engagement –Working with EAUC & London Higher

Maximising Data Centre Efficiency – Bristol March 2011 Research & Exploration Cloud computing –Work with colleges through 157 Group Video-conferencing and events Scientific computing and energy usage in labs How to engage users in owning the problem Pledging systems How sustainable is thin-client (really)? Exploring where the energy goes in the server room

Maximising Data Centre Efficiency – Bristol March 2011 Technical Innovation Powering down super-computers Rationalising file storage System to share high-end kit both with and across institutions Print substitution via e-Readers Widgets to display energy usage Open-source PC Powerdown solution Photo-voltaic-cells to power evaporative coolers in a data-centre

Maximising Data Centre Efficiency – Bristol March 2011 Estates Engagement Aim is to build capacity in Estates for working with innovation and to foster links with IT Projects: –Tackling laboratory energy use –Heat and light by timetable –Tackling heating and cooling overshoots –Further work to improve the legacy data-centre

Maximising Data Centre Efficiency – Bristol March 2011 Institutional Transformation Procurement and Scope 3 Emissions –Getting a handle on the rest of the carbon –Good links with procurement, estates, and IT Understanding the environmental implications of different modes of curriculum delivery –Does it matter? What might be the best way forward? Energy use and students –How to engage with this rapidly changing constituency Academic events and travel –Understanding the place that travel has in academic life

Maximising Data Centre Efficiency – Bristol March 2011 Results to date Phase I projects starting to report – headlines: –Planet Filestore Project (Cardiff) – shows relevance of moving infrequently accessed files to lower tiers of storage. Being funded to develop online decision application to allow others to see if this makes sense for them Pembrokeshire College – Will be making their pledging system open source and releasing code and how-to guides Thin client investigation at Leeds Met shows a well specified low power conventional PC is more efficient than thin-client in real world situations Open source code from Oxford that helps people running high-performance computer clusters power down idle nodes Review of e-Reader devices and their usefulness in paper substitution (Edgehill University)

Maximising Data Centre Efficiency – Bristol March 2011 Looking ahead – 2020 Agendas Technology/material transitions Energy aware software Net zero carbon - data centres - networks - supply chains System integration - grid related location Local integration Greening the cloud

Maximising Data Centre Efficiency – Bristol March JISC’s Greening ICT Programme EU C of C JISC’s Green ICT Blog Good Campus Site –Home of Suste-IT outputs and much more #greenict - Tag in use on Twitter et al

Maximising Data Centre Efficiency – Bristol March 2011 Rob Bristow –Programme Manager (Green ICT) –+44 (0) –Twitter: robbristow –Blog: –Mailing list: –Sign up at: