Unit-1

Chapter-1(Text Book1)

Green IT Fundamentals:
Business, IT, and the Environment

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Green Computing Definition:
Green computing has been defined or described by several sources including Murugesan (2008), Lamb (2009),
Unhelkar (2010a and 2010c, 2011). Green IT definition appears in Wikipedia, 2010 as well.

But it is the definition of Murugesan (2008) that is particularly comprehensive: “the study and practice of designing,
manufacturing, using, and disposing of computers, servers, and associated subsystems (such as monitors, printers,
storage devices, and networking and communications systems) efficiently and effectively with minimal or no impact
on the environment.”

Ā is definition can be interpreted as serving an organization’s attempt to achieve economic viability and improve
system performance and use, while abiding the social and ethical responsibilities.

Lamb (2009) simplifies this definition: “Green IT is the study and practice of using computing resources efficiently.”

Ā us, Green IT includes the dimensions of environmental sustainability, the economics of energy
efficiency, and the total cost of ownership, which includes the cost of disposal and recycling.

Note: Ā e term IT implies information, technology, and communications domain. Occasionally, the term ICT is
used—especially in emphasizing the communications aspect of IT. 2
Information technology influences business, society, and
environment—lead up to
the sustainable triangle

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Major IT Area Influencing Environment

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Green Enterprise Characteristics

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Green Enterprise Characteristics
• IT as a Producer: Ā is very first attempt by an organization at Green IT
is to handle the emissions produced by the IT gadgets themselves. Ā is,
as shown in Figure , aims to reduce IT’s own emissions that is based on
the end-user computer emissions as well as those from the data centers
housing the servers and communications equipment.

• IT as an Enabler: Ā is area of IT includes its use to enable reduction

of emissions across all areas of an enterprise. Ā us, IT systems, supply
chains, contents, and metrics together with specific CEMS play a role at
this level of a green organization. IT governance also plays a role
• in controlling the procurement and the disposal of IT equipment
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Green Enterprise Characteristics
• Green Enterprise: Ā is the level of an organization that is holistically applying
environmental strategies to all aspects of its business—irrespective of IT. While
IT remains a vital part of this initiative, a green enterprise also deals with
infrastructure and buildings, people and attitude, legal and standards, and
marketing and sales—areas that may not be directly IT but are supported by IT.
• Green Collaboration: Going beyond a single enterprise, this is a collaboration
of green enterprises that may come together due to their belonging to a common
vertical market, or providing collaborative services using web services on a
global scale. Ā ese collaborative organizations are consortium-based approaches
to green enterprises that aim to reduce carbon emissions across multiple
organizations. While they are the most challenging and complex Green IT effort,
they have a far more long-lasting effect than that of a single organization

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List of challenges faced by organizations in their
endeavor to be ready for the carbon economy:
• Contextual nature of the environmental sustainability initiative
• Subjective nature of Green IT that depends on the context and also on the personal motivation
• of the individual
• Lack of robust metrics and measurements associated with Green IT
• Lack of understanding of drivers for the environmental sustainability initiative
• Likely confusion due to number of motivators and drivers for a green initiative
• Lack of robust metrics and measurements across all dimensions of an organization
• Lack of availability of substantial “winning stories” and corresponding supporting metrics
• Uncertainty in terms of rules and regulations that can be applied and adhered to with
confidence
• Uncertainty in terms of the scopes of the emissions to be included in the calculations
• Technologies such as virtualization, thin clients, and Cloud computing are implemented in
• organizations, but not for improving its environmental performance
• Lack of justification (ROI) for investing in the environmental sustainability solutions
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Environmental Intelligence
• Expands the technologies of Business Intelligence for the purpose of
reducing the organization’s carbon footprint—leading into what is
called Environmental Intelligence (EI)
• Procuring and installing a CEMS is also a part of this utilization of IT
resources—but from a systems and applications viewpoint. An
interesting part of this extension and use of IT resources comes from
the extension and application of the concepts and technologies of
business intelligence to the environmental initiative of the
organization

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Business Intelligence
• Business intelligence derives knowledge, or insights, by analyzing an
organization’s information. Ā is information can be of many different
types including carbon data, financial data, environmental parameters,
human relations data, and organizational strategy data.
• BI as a suite of technologies that are well positioned to be used with
regards to the environmental initiatives of the organization (Unhelkar
and Tiwary, 2011). Such use of BI for the environment would combine
people together with the aforementioned technologies and processes
• (Unhelkar and Tiwary, 2010).

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Business to Environmental Intelligence Impact across the
Technical Process, Social and Economic Dimensions of an
Organization

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Environmental intelligence intersects people, process, and
technologies, and creates new correlations in the organizational
data warehouses.

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Reference:
• Bhuvan Unhelkar. Green IT Strategies and Applications-Using
Environmental Intelligence, CRC Press, 2011.

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