Green Revolution Begins to Expand into IT Services

Credit Union Journal
December 11, 2007 | COMMENTS

The so-called "Green Revolution" is expanding into IT services, one of the biggest consumers of electricity and other resources.

The Data Management Institute and Archive Management.org (AMO) have launched a joint initiative to develop a strategic approach for Data Center greening. "The Green Data Project (www.greendataproject.org) is an international online community, resource site, and web publication focused on managing electronic data in order to reduce electrical power demands in corporate IT," according to its founders.

Jon William Toigo, founder of both Data Management Institute and AMO, said there are already other initiatives under way, "but almost all of them are advancing tactical measures involving hardware technologies rather than strategic approaches focused on archive and data management. Green IT must begin with green data. Otherwise a company's data center greening initiative amounts to little more than rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic."

Toigo suggested that servers will shortly be overtaken by storage arrays as the biggest power hogs in the corporate data center. Driving the acquisition of storage capacity, he said, is a general failure of companies to manage their data, which is stored on expansive storage infrastructure.

Toigo cited statistics from Sun Microsystems that show only about 30% of the space on any hard disk is actually hosting business relevant and frequently accessed information. An additional 40% of the data on disk may be important to retain for regulatory or historical reasons, but is so rarely accessed that it could be readily migrated into an archival repository—preferably one constructed using near- or off-line media, like tape or optical, that consume little or no electricity, according to Toigo.

The Green Data Project is arguing that throwing more disk arrays to achieve data center power efficiency, or adding the complexities of thin provisioning software, de-duplication software, or compression software, does not constitute a strategic or permanent solution to the twin problems of storage growth and burgeoning power demands.

"The hardware vendors are reacting in a predictable way to capitalize on a popular trend: Green IT," Toigo said. "They are leveraging concerns about power availability and cost, and the growing eco-consciousness of many firms, to sell more gear. They are joined by many software providers who want to wrap their wares in the green flag when, in fact, they contribute little more than a tactical and short-lived delay in 300% growth in disk storage analysts are expecting over the next three years."

This article appeared at www.cujournal.com and is reprinted with permission.