Energy Efficient Technologies
On Thursday evening, under tornado warnings, the Energy Efficient Technologies roundtable event was held at the Life Sciences Center in Cool Springs. The panelists, led by Frank Platt of Nexus Group, discussed ways that companies could save money and become more efficient. The panel included Dave Linzy, LPS Integration; Mike Ponke, Sun Microsystems; Frank Gall, Dewpoint and Rob Preininger, Walick-Kemp.
Cutting cost was the main focus of the event. Costs can continue to escalate due to power and cooling needs, however virtualization was one of the obvious solutions presented to help cut those costs. Another positive aspect the panelists are experiencing is gains around new chip technologies on servers that provide better efficiency. The experts also mentioned that a lot of costs can be cut and energy can be conserved by managers simply paying attention to their environment, both internally and externally.
Corporate Social Responsibility falls on the data center supervisor to set goals to analyze and measure emissions and figure out how to reduce those emissions without raising expense The easiest way to cut data center cost has been to simply move their staff offsite. Call Centers in the U.S have taken this approach by having their employees work from home, which can save a company more than 8-10% on energy costs. Here are some other energy efficient solutions to keep in mind:
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Develop server management policies
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Implement desktop virtualization
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Bring in outside groups to help
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See how your company can save energy
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Keep all of your options open
In closing, David Linzy mentioned that 3% of energy consumption in this country is attributed to our data centers and that no one has really taken ownership of an energy consumption bill. Rob Preininger did mention to watch for a government website that will cover the stimulus money that will be used for IT (Links provided). This could affect the way companies view spending money related to energy efficient technologies.
The Social Networking “craze” has introduced us to a whole new way of interacting with others – complete with its own vocabulary. What may come as a surprise is that Social Networking – along with the tool sets it brings – is just the latest in a series of tools used for Collaboration. An even bigger surprise for some may be that these same Social Networking tools can have a major impact when used in a business context!
