Focus on Green IT

A) Meeting regulatory needs

B) Reduce CO² emissions as a social responsibility

C) Adopting and promoting Green policies.

What organizations can do about Green IT?Greener business and healthier bottom line is what every company aspire for. Organizations can take numerous Green IT initiatives to help address their environmental responsibilities whilst maintaining or improving costs and service levels.

IT Related iniatitives

A) Greener Data Centres that ensure lesser emission and

smarter cooling

B) Better and smarter cooling systems for machine and people

C) Usage of tight policies on screen saver, shut desktops after

office hours

D) Usage of Grid computing, virtualization and KVM

E) Architect an application or hardware with Conscience

F) Use of technology to stitch the gap for communication and transport department thus enabling smarter utilization of company provided transport. Other areas are in the space of Building Automation Systems (BAS) which controls the lighting and temperature of the facilities.

G) Convergence of IT systems thus enabling lesser space utilization per person, thus bring down the overall area per square feet requirment per employee.

HR Related iniatitives

A) Introduce Work from home option where ever possible

B) Move to complete paperless office

C) Introducing CO² burn points against each BU/LOB

D) Creating Green policies that would be part of G&O of individuals

Enterprise Related iniatitives

A) Greener buildings

B) Use natural light and Change all light bulbs into CFL

C) Smarter options of landscaping the office premise

D) Telecommute instead of air travel

E) Use the power of Sun to fuel the energy requirements

F) Sensible ways to dispose e-waste

G) Ensuring no plastic bags are used for any product that is sold by the corporate

Conclusion: India has several large companies that has ingredients which can make it successful in the alternative energy area: availability of natural resources, cost-effective engineering and manufacturing talent. It also has the will to identify green iniatiatives. Its important that these iniatiatives have clear agenda in each sphere of the organization. This topic clearly identifies the IT side of the story.

If we were to go back to our early adaptor of green buildings, Emperor Shahjahan and if he were alive today, surely he could have gone in for a LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification for the Taj Mahal and his other magnificent buildings and palaces. In fact, he could have earned quite a few million dollars through the CERs gained (much like Olympia Technology Park). The money earned could have easily gone in to finance the Black Taj Mahal that he wished to make. And we would have one more magnificent edifice that we could admire and pride on. Now wouldn’t that be something worth heaving a sigh: Wah Wah Taj?