Serendipity

I’m just collecting some readings for my grad course next week, for which the topic is Green IT. Here’s what I came up with:

• Murugesan, “Harnessing Green IT: Principles and Practices“
• the GeSI report, “Using ICTs to Tackle Climate Change“
• Barroso and Holzle “The case for energy-proportional computing“
• the WWF report “From Green IT to Greening with IT“
• Pamlin and Szomolányi, “Saving Climate at the Speed of Light“
• The Climate Group “Smart 2020 report“

Murugesan seems to give the best overview, although I also like the case studies in the GeSI report. The latter is dated November 2010, so it’s pretty much up to date.

The WWF report makes the important point that as the energy consumption of computers only make up about 2% of global greenhouse gas emissions, the potential for incremental solutions that focus on more energy efficient computing are relatively small, while the potential for emissions reduction by applying smart IT solutions to other sectors (e.g. reducing the need for travel, smart buildings, dematerialization) is much greater. Hence the suggested shift in terminology, from “Green IT” to “Greening with IT”.

Which brings me to another plug for Bill Tomlinson’s excellent book, “Greening through IT“, which I ought to get around to reviewing properly…