It’s Earth Week—that period of the year now set aside for all the “green topics” that we should be thinking about all the time—but most of us are just too doggone busy to really “go green” in some significant way.
I admit it—I get “guilted out” during these Green Days and Earth Days and such (although I do like the band Greenday and American Idiot). I hate my low-flush toilet. I like long showers (and my friends seem to encourage me to spend more time in there). I can’t stand separating all the garbage into piles and cans (I secretly think the trash company just jumbles it all together anyway). Even though I have designed green data centers, have CompTIA’s Green IT credential, and drive a hybrid car, I confess that I am just not that keen on saving the planet. What are we saving it from? Other people? My sense is that they’ll just figure out something crazy to do to it in the next century—we just haven’t had a good record in this area. Most of the technology we dream up has a bad habit of blowing up people in new and more lethal ways.
So, while it’s hard to get psyched up about forestalling the onset of global warming and glacial flooding while sitting 7000 feet high up in the Rockies, I can tell you something that I am excited about saving—and that’s Money. That’s right. Money. Cold, hard Cash (and dad always said, “when you say “cash”, say it slowly”). Benjamins. Moolah. Bread. Dinero. Bone. Scratch.
In other words, Green.
Maybe I am just a bad person, but channeling my inner Gordon Gecko, I am learning about just how much power PC systems consume in America. While we are becoming more aware of the energy consumed in data centers around the U.S. (estimates are from 2-3% of all electricity consumed), most people don’t realize how much energy is wasted just keeping unused computers powered on. Estimates range, but recent data shows that $2.8 billion is wasted annually by PCs, monitors and laptops in the U.S. alone. As Ernie Hudson, playing the character of Winston Zeddemore in Ghostbusters, said:
“That’s a big Twinkie.”
But before you get all guilted out, try a simple exercise.
Go to http://www.verdiem.com/edison.aspx and download Edison, a cool little free software app to manage the power on your home PC (Win 7, Vista, or XP, no Mac version now; network version available for purchase). Easy to install, and easy to customize—let’s admit it, the power settings on our operating system software generally left us unsatisfied—and our systems turned to zombies when we tried to reactivate them following a period of inactivity. Edison is better, much better.
Once you get everything installed (use the defaults), you get a chance to see how much power you can save (there’s even a place where you can plug in your local electricity rate—something I am sure everyone knows!—and see how much power you can save annually).
You work from a main screen as the program runs efficiently in the background (not a big resource hog, just another service running in Windows), and you get to play “Save the Planet” by calculating the carbon footprint of your system. You also can play “Save Me Some Dough for the Weekend” (my favorite game) by calculating how much money these simple settings can save you when it comes time to paying for power.
How many computers do you have at home? At the Bauer house, that would be 12, not counting a few servers and storage systems (yes, my wife and I are hopeless geeks). If I could save $44.23/year with one system, with twelve systems I would save….ah…more money!
You see where I am going here, right? Imagine if we took a look at all the PCs in our office environment. We might be able to save our companies thousands, tens of thousands of dollars a year simply by coming up with a group policy (and managing it from the network, not system by system like we often do). I know this subject causes IT administrators to freak out (the early versions of Windows Power Management were simply Bluescreen Generation Software), but things are better. Of course, some power users work late, and there are exceptions (if you are running back-up sweeps, there are utilities to wake up your system before the desktop back-up, etc.), but I want you to think about the money you can save your company. Maybe you can argue the cost savings instead of the raise that you didn’t get last year!
CompTIA is a part of the Climate Savers Computing Initiative, where we are trying to get corporate management to realize how much $$$ is being wasted by simply not powering down systems when they are not being used. Not a radical idea, no need for ideology or further proof of global warming, no tree-hugging or Birkenstock’s required—just saving some good old American greenbacks.
And I am all for getting my “green” back.