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Greener Businesses

and
Eco-friendly Data Centers






Submitted By:
Abhishek Raj Patel
A039
Banking Management
INTRODUCTION:
Fast depleting energy resources and concern over global warming are leading the organizations
around the world towards the sustainable business or green business, where the organizations
ensure that all the activities and processes they are involved in, have minimal negative impact on the
local as well as global environment, economy and society. These organizations are making great
efforts to meet the triple bottom line: profit, people and planet. Businesses have started taking
range of green initiatives like, paperless communication with use of electronic correspondence,
recycling of products, reducing production wastes etc. Attraction of investors towards the greener
business is also added incentives for organizations for such practices.
Datacenter facilities have become common and essential to the functioning of business,
communications, academic, and even governmental systems since every office shift from paper-
based to digital information management. Data centers are found in nearly every sector of the
economy: financial services, IT services, media, universities and many others use data centers to aid
their business processes, storage of information and communications.
Before talking about green data centers, first let us understand what a Data Center is. A Data center
is a special facility that physically houses various equipment, such as computers, database and
application servers , data storage devices, switches routers, load balancers, wire cages or closets,
vaults, racks, and related equipment. It can store, process, manage and exchange digital data and
provide application or management services for various data processing applications.
The evolution in technology also has made impact on the data centers. The data centers have their
roots in huge computer rooms of early years of computing industry. Special environments were
needed for operation of huge, complex systems. Use of cables for connections, cable trays and racks
for storage were necessary and also, a single mainframe required a great deal of power, and had to
be cooled to avoid overheating. During 1980s development of personal computers the use of the
term "data center," as applied to specially designed computer rooms, started to gain popular
recognition. The boom of data centers came during internet bubble/dotcom bubble. Many
companies started building Internet data centers (IDCs), which provide businesses with a range of
solutions for systems deployment and operation. Increasing scale and requirement of operations
eventually migrated towards the more efficient data centers, now called as Cloud data centers.
With an increase in the uptake of cloud data centers, business and government organizations are
scrutinizing data centers to a higher degree in areas such as availability, security, environmental
impact and adherence to standards. Energy efficient data centers are gathering momentum as
organizations have started realizing their importance in energy conservation and sustainable
development. New technologies that can help in cutting down data center energy costs and saving
energy and thus money are being used. With use of advanced technology and strategies green data
centers are being constructed. Use of low emission building materials, recycling of wastes, use of
alternative energy technologies, sustainable landscaping, etc are the characteristics of modern green
data centers. Building a green data center or other facility can be expensive up front, but long-term
cost savings can be realized on operations and maintenance.

HOW TO MAKE YOUR DATA CENTER GREEN:
Green data center strategy enables an enterprise to improve profitability by long-term cost saving
on operations and maintenance. It also contributes towards creating an healthy work environment
and enhancing relations with local communities. The Environmental Protection Agency has made
recommendations for a green data center, which include following points:
Know your current energy use in order to know the starting point.
Review metrics regularly to track progress, and make adjustments as needed
Rather than purchasing too many servers, optimize the use of servers.
Remember that performance goes hand-in-hand with power efficiency.
Install network equipment that streamlines the management and efficiency of Web and
application infrastructure.
Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) acceleration/download helps servers operate more efficiently,
which means the data center uses less power.
Deploy low-energy consumption network devices, which lower energy bills and reduce
cooling requirements.
DETERMING AND MONITORING ENERGY USAGE
Data centers are notorious for their power consumption. Initially the focus of data centers was on
performance and availability of networks and never on the amount of power consumption for their
operations. With a larger data center, this amount increases more rapidly.
So the first step towards making a green data center is to determine the energy usage and monitor
for peak usage and low-energy demand cycle. In general data center employees beyond the
manager have not been concerned with the energy cost, which needs to be changed. Organizations
should monitor the power consumptions, implement reduction of power consumption and share it
with appropriate staff regularly and revised as needed.
MINIMIZING COSTS WITH MAXIMIZING PERFORMANCE
The technology has eased the decision to choose between maximizing performance or minimizing
cost for organizations. The success of e-commerce and online communication with customers and
venders has increased performance of these organizations. But as the information accessed and
shared becomes more bandwidth consuming and complex, it becomes important for optimum
performance of networks and application infrastructures and hence the data centers.
OPTIMIZING SERVER EFFICIENCY
There could be no doubt on topic on increasing efficiency by anyone. Deploying an Application
Delivery Controller (ADC) has become a strategic means for achieving efficient Web site, Internet
and intranet connectivity, backed by performance and energy conservation. It can measure number
of concurrent connections, memory in use and many more. It also acts as monitor and controller
between the users and servers directing traffic. The efficiency of the server is directly related to
energy cost and hence improved efficiency minimizes cost.

THE GOOGLE GREEN:
At Google, we've worked hard to minimize the environmental impact of our services. In fact,
when we provide an active user one month of Google services, we use less energy than
driving a car one mile. If you add in our renewable energy and offsets, our footprint is zero.
And we continue to find new ways to reduce our impact even further.
Google is a US based Multinational Corporation, which specializes in internet-related
services and products. These include search, software, mobile platforms, applications, online
advertising and cloud computing. Google came into existence in September 1998 and since
then is one of the leaders in technology. Over the years, Google was a lot in the news due to
its innovative energy conservation ideas. For over 10 years, Google has been building some
of the most efficient data centers.

Here are few highlights of the Google.

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Recent Steps taken by Google in green technology:

In 2012, Google bought 48MW of wind energy in Oklahoma to power a data center
that helps store Gmail, Google Docs and search engine results.
In final quarter on 2013-14, Google invested $2.25Bn on green data center and
infrastructure.
On November 14,2013 Google announced its 14
th
investment in renewable energy
will be in form of $80Mn towards use of solar energy for California and Arizona data
centers.


FUTURE OF GREEN DATA CENTERS:

In future, with greater business demands for online and mobile applications and data
residing in the datacentre, the need for greater flexibility is only going to grow. Energy
efficiency and reducing cost of power are two constraints, the organization have to work
with. Green data centers are the answers to these problems and even various regulations
around the world are being implemented to guide the organizations towards them.
A recent debate of CIOs about future of the datacentre focussed more upon data center
efficiency and transformation.




REFERENCES:
http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Green-IT/How-to-Make-Your-Datacenter-Green/3/
http://www.google.co.in/green/bigpicture/
http://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240104469/The-new-future-of-datacentres
http://www.greenbiz.com/blog/2013/11/15/facebook-google-and-box-share-3-tips-greener-
data-center
http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2013/11/green-source-rider/

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