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Hot on the heels of Emerson Network’s conference this month to launch its EnergyLogic framework to reduce energy consumption in the data centre, APC, a power and cooling services vendor, has announced the debut of APC TradeOff Tools. These web-based applications have easy-to-use interfaces designed for use in the early stages of data centre concept and design development. The TradeOff tools were launched at a press event attended by Dimension Data, Frost & Sullivan and the government of South Australia’s John Maunder, who is the CIO of Corporate Services Division for the government.

Maunder was there as South Australia is leading the nation in being at the forefront of energy and infrastructure environmental issues. For example, 50% of the wind power supplied to the energy grid comes from South Australia; likewise, 40% of the solar power is supplied by the state.

South Australia has a well-developed green IT plan which Maunder said illustrates how the state uses IT more intelligently, whereby it saves money as well as energy.

By enabling data centre professionals to experiment with various scenarios regarding virtualisation, efficiency, power sizing, capital costs and other key design issues, APC TradeOff Tools break down major data centre planning decisions into a series of smaller, more manageable decisions. Use of these tools helps validate, through modelling, the overall design of a data centre.

The tools include: Carbon Calculator, Energy Efficiency Calculator, Capital Cost Calculator, Virtualisation Energy Cost Calculator, Power Sizing Calculator, InRow Containment Selector and AC vs DC Calculator.

Dimension Data is assisting organisations to identify opportunities and develop a plan to optimise energy and materials use in their office operations, based on the organisation’s overall corporate strategy to reduce its environmental impact. The four key modules making up the services are: Accounting and Reporting; Stakeholder Engagement; Opportunity Analysis; and Emissions Reduction.

“While Australia’s new National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting System requires our largest emitters of greenhouse gases to monitor and measure their emissions with a view to introducing reduction programs, there is pressure on all organisations, regardless of the size of emission levels, to take steps to reduce their impact on climate change,” said Gerard Florian, chief technology officer, Dimension Data.

“For an office-based organisation, its ICT infrastructure is a significant contributor to its greenhouse gas emissions, and a number of our clients in this space have approached us asking how they can respond to pressure from their executive to reduce waste and cut energy use.”

As well as addressing a need amongst Dimension Data’s client base, the services were also developed from the company’s own experience in responding to the measurement and reporting requirements of the Carbon Disclosure Project, an international not-for-profit organisation for institutional investors seeking information on the business risks and opportunities presented by climate change and greenhouse gas emissions data from the world's largest companies.

Three key areas were quickly identified as significant contributors to Dimension Data’s greenhouse gas emissions: energy consumption, staff travel and waste. In all three, IT has a significant role to play.

Integ Communications, an Australian integrator of communications and networking technologies and a UXC company, has also launched a new service aimed at reducing the amount of hazardous electronic equipment waste Australia sends to landfill each year.

The new service, called iDispose, has been launched in response to customer research which found that 82% of organisations rank the responsible disposal of e-waste as their top environmental concern.

Available to customers across Australia, iDispose offers a solution for safe disposal of electronic equipment that has reached the end of its life or is no longer in service, usually as a result of a technology refresh project. Integ has partnered with Sims E-Recycling, the Australian division of Sims Recycling Solutions, the world's largest electronics recycler, to deliver the required services and to make it easy for customers to safely dispose of unwanted or redundant equipment and electronic parts.

Customers are charged a fee for the service, which includes the removal, disassembly and disposal of all unwanted electronic waste after which the customer is supplied with a report and certificate of recycling as required.

Ian Poole, CEO, Integ Group, said iDispose removes the difficulties of identifying and disposing of e-waste. It lets businesses focus on their investment in new technology while doing their bit for the environment.

iDispose is just one element of Integ's environmental solutions with more services planned for introduction later this year. Integ launched iTaaS, its IP telephony-as-a-service solution late in 2007 and is currently introducing a telephony solution for the mid-market that uses virtualisation to house all applications on one appliance. Both solutions reduce the environmental impact of ICT by minimising equipment in use and reducing energy consumption.

 

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