Articles from Greentech Media

Adobe Adds 400 Kilowatts of Bloom Fuel Cells

Explore Greentech Media (Feb 2 2012) Emissions , Fuel Cell

But can the fuel cell firm survive as subsidies fade? Earlier this week Adobe announced that it had added another 400 kilowatts of Bloom Energy fuel cells to its current fleet of Bloom Boxes. I spoke with Mike Bangs, Adobe's Director of Global Facilities, about the installation. The two 200-kilowatt units installed at the company's San Francisco site are Bloom's next-generation design and put out twice the

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Comment Mentions:   Google   Adobe   Kleiner Perkins

Stat of the Week: 145 Terawatt Hours

Explore Greentech Media (Aug 24 2011) Servers

When most people think of greentech products, computer memory probably doesn’t come to mind. The world’s voracious appetite for data, however, will push it to the forefront, argues Jim Elliott, a vice president of marketing at Samsung Electronics. Samsung remains the number one manufacturer of DRAM, used to temporarily store data in computers, and flash memory, used to store data permanently. The Internet generates 31 exabytes, or 31 quintillion bytes, of data a month. Google ran out of memory space for around 80 minutes when Google+ launched, he said. DRAM demand will likely grow six times between 2010 and 2015, with new shipments hitting 1,266 petabytes that year. DRAM, don’t forget, is only temporary storage: the figure doesn’t include persistent storage devices like flash or drives. With 1,266 petabytes, or 1.2 exabytes, you'd almost have enough memory to store a digital version ... (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   Google   International Energy Agency   Facebook

General Electric Unveils Efficient Data Center

Explore Greentech Media (Aug 18 2011) Wind , Cloud Computing

Greentech Media (blog)General Electric Unveils Efficient Data CenterGreentech Media (blog)Green IT has grown rapidly as a result. Some of the leading ideas for curbing power have been weather mapping inside of data centers (Sentilla, SynapSense), application shifting (PowerAssure), improved AC controls (Vigilent), switching from AC to DC ... (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   Norway   General Electric   Greentech Media

AMD and the Solar-Powered Data Center

Explore Greentech Media (Aug 1 2011)

Greentech Media (blog)AMD and the Solar-Powered Data CenterGreentech Media (blog)Green IT has grown rapidly as a result. Some of the leading ideas for curbing power have been weather mapping inside of data centers (Sentilla, SynapSense), application shifting (PowerAssure), improved AC controls (Vigilent), switching from AC to DC ...and more » (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   Hewlett Packard   Greentech Media

A Roadmap to Green IT

Explore Greentech Media (Apr 13 2011) Servers

Computers are both a good news and bad news story when it comes to sustainability and energy. First, the good news. Computers are a boon to the environment. Rack-mounted servers consume about 2.5 percent of all of the electricity in the U.S., but consider the myriad of services -- email, Twitter, online shopping, banking -- you get from them. Lighting consumes 22 percent, but you could shut off the lights in your office now and probably continue to do your job. (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   Google   Norway   General Electric

Schneider Electric Buys Another Company: This Time for Datacenters

Explore Greentech Media (Apr 4 2011)

Greentech Media (blog)Schneider Electric Buys Another Company: This Time for DatacentersGreentech Media (blog)Other acquisition targets in this market include Powerloft (data center design), Nextek Power Systems (DC power equipment), and Validus DC Systems. Over the past year, Schneider Electric has also unfurled EV charging stations and home energy management ...and more » (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   Google   Greentech Media   Validus DC Systems

What Happens to the Renewable Grid on a Cloudy Day?

Explore Greentech Media (Oct 4 2010)

Can utility-scale energy storage make renewables dispatchable? Many energy investors and utility executives believe that gigawatt quantities of energy storage will be needed to handle the onrush of variable power from wind and solar technologies. Maurice Gunderson, a partner at venture firm CMEA Capital, believes that grid-scale storage is one of the “game-changers” in the alternative energy battle. (Gunderson has been working in the energy industry for more than 30 years and co-founded the first greentech investing firm, nth Power.) (Read Full Article)

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Data Center Tools Move From Monitoring to Control

Explore Greentech Media (Sep 20 2010) Monitoring , Servers

Until recently, tools for reducing power in data centers have functioned like consultants: they gave recommendations but didn't really help you implement them. The picture is changing as competition heats up, demand increases and the technology improves. (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   Greentech Media   Department of Energy

Infrastructure Upgrades at TIAA-CREF Manhattan Headquarters Expected to Save $ ...

Explore Greentech Media (Sep 14 2010)

TIAA-CREF, one of the largest institutional real estate investors in the United States, will be recognized by Trane for energy efficiency initiatives, including a rooftop thermal storage solution at the company’s headquarters in midtown Manhattan that is anticipated to save $765,000 annually in energy and operating costs. TIAA-CREF also will receive $219,000 from the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) to help support installation of this energy-efficient technology. “We believe that energy efficiency can help to improve returns and reduce our corporate impact on the environment,” said Jeff Meaney, senior vice president, corporate services, TIAA-CREF. “The thermal ice storage solution we are now using to cool our 730 Third Avenue headquarters, also part of our real estate investment portfolio, is a perfect example of the types of accretive capital improvements we seek to maintain high-quality facilities for our employees and clients.” (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   Europe   Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

The Biggest Green Market? Seven Reasons Why It's Green IT

Explore Greentech Media (Sep 2 2010) Solar , Wind

Over the past few weeks, I've had a number of meetings with engineers, executives and investors and such, and I keep coming away with the same conclusion. The fastest-growing and arguably most attractive segment in alternative energy and energy efficiency lies in hardware, software and networking equipment. Yep, green IT. (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   Apple   Fujitsu   Intel

EPA Releases Data Center Energy Star Label

Explore Greentech Media (Jun 8 2010) Servers

Greentech MediaEPA Releases Data Center Energy Star LabelGreentech Media... released its long awaited Energy Star label for data centers on Monday, likely sparking a new round of data-center energy-efficiency improvements. ...and more » (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   Google   The Green Grid   Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

HP Asks: Can Manure Run Data Centers?

Explore Greentech Media (May 18 2010) Geothermal , Wind

Calls for data-center energy efficiency grow louder each year as massive computing warehouses approach the limits of available power. Companies such as Google and Microsoft have responded by building facilities in unlikely settings, such as central Oregon, North Carolina and Iowa, where cheap, abundant energy from sources such as hydropower can be found. Iceland says its broadband links to North America and Europe and its abundant geothermal power make it an ideal location for large data centers. (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   Iceland   Europe   Google

Fjords, Caves and Mines: The New Tools for Building Data Centers

Explore Greentech Media (Apr 28 2010) Geothermal , Servers

Local Host has created a cooling system for data-centers that siphons icy water from 984 feet below the surface of Norway's Nordfjord. Now the startup wants to build the world's largest green data center in an abandoned mine. Local Host CEO Sindre Kvalheim says his goal is to build "the world's largest, high-security green data center." There are reasons to think he might succeed. The central coast Sogn og Fjordane region of Norway has an abundance of cheap hydro-electric and wind power to run racks of energy-hungry servers. The company already attracted the attention of IBM and Tandberg. Now it plans to reach out to Google and Microsoft for the $100 million it needs to complete the project. (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   Iceland   Google   Norway

Why Antivirus Vendors Could Become Kings of Green Computing

Explore Greentech Media (Jan 27 2010) Cloud Computing

f you stop to think about it for a second, antivirus specialists like Symantec and McAfee seem born to manage energy consumption. These companies already enjoy a trusted brand name with the vast majority of the computer-owning public, and generally it's a positive association. They don't engender the sort of conflicting emotions that Microsoft or Google can. During a virus outbreak, consumers are glad they own the software. More importantly, these companies already have a persistent relationship with consumers. Adobe and Firefox send out updates occasionally, but the timing is irregular and generally the upgrades are optional. By contrast, antivirus companies contact consumers on a regular basis, and you need what they are pushing down the pipe. Very few people refuse a patch. (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   Cisco   At&T   Microsoft Corp

Bluestone Energy and adaptivcool Link Up in New England

Explore Greentech Media (Dec 1 2009) Power and Cooling , Servers

Bluestone Energy Services, which designs and implements energy efficiency projects for commercial and industrial buildings, has a new data center partnership in New England. The Norwell, Mass.-based company said Tuesday that it has an exclusive arrangement with data center cooling startup AdaptivCool for all projects in the territories of utilities NStar and National Grid. AdaptivCool makes systems that pinpoint "hot spots" in data center aisles and racks, and floor tile fans that direct cold air to those hot spots. That can help data centers cut their cooling bills by 30 percent or so – not bad, considering that cooling can use up to half the energy for some data centers (see AdaptivCool: The Goldilocks of Data Center Cooling). (Read Full Article)

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Fortune Data Centers Earns LEED Gold Certification From U.S. Green ...

Explore Greentech Media (Nov 6 2009) Construction , Servers

Fortune Data Centers, which provides premium efficiency data centers, announced today that the company has earned the prestigious Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Gold Certification from the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) for its San Jose facility. The data center is among the largest in Silicon Valley with a power capacity to serve 8 megawatts of critical load for IT infrastructure and the first LEED Gold certified data center in San Jose. A review of industry sources suggests that there are fewer than five LEED Gold certified data centers operating in the United States, and Fortune believes its facility is the first multi-tenant data center to receive the LEED Gold Certification for 100% of the usable tenant space. LEED is the nation’s preeminent program for the design, construction and operation of high performance green buildings. (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   LEED

Data Center Efficiency: Pulling It All Together

Explore Greentech Media (Oct 26 2009) Cloud Computing , Servers

Arch Rock has a new data center energy efficiency package that reads it all – electricity use, temperature and humidity, even fan speeds and airflow. Making data centers energy efficient is a balancing act, involving a lot of variables. Without a system that brings all those variables together, efficiency improvements are flying blind. Here's an example from Roland Acre, CEO of Arch Rock. Server makers have raised the maximum temperatures their equipment can run at, giving data center operators room to play with more efficient cooling techniques, he said. (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   Hewlett Packard   IBM   CA

PG&E OKs Rebates for Data Storage, Sees Thermal Energy Storage Next

Explore Greentech Media (Sep 22 2009) Storage

PG&E adds thin provisioning and MAID data storage systems to the data center technologies it will pay people to install. Next up could be cooling water at night to drive cooling during the day. Pacific Gas & Electric has added energy efficient data storage – specifically thin provisioning and massive array of idled disks, or MAID, storage – to the host of technologies that can earn data centers some hefty rebates. Next on the PG&E's list of data center efficiencies – thermal energy storage, or using cheap nighttime power to chill water or make ice to cool data centers during the day. The Northern California utility has given out about $20 million since 2006 to encourage data centers to get more efficient, starting with better cooling and power supply systems and moving on to virtualization and more efficient servers (Read Full Article)

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Old Chip Tech Establishes Its Green Credentials

Explore Greentech Media (Jul 22 2009)

Think of silicon on insulator (SOI) as adult diapers for semiconductors. The techology – a layer of material inserted into chips – wraps around transistors to prevent power from leaking out. The smaller transistors become, the bigger issue leakage becomes. The technology debuted in the '90s – and was heavily promoted by IBM – as a way to improve performance, boost chip speed and reduce the waste heat that can cause computers to malfunction or even melt. Now, the SOI Consortium wants data center owners and others to understand how SOI-enabled chips can reduce power. "The transistor is essentially isolated on all three dimensions," said Horacio Mendez, executive director of the SOI Consortium. "IBM went for high performance when frequency and speed were everything." (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   Intel   IBM

IBM Delves Into Lithium-Air Batteries, Water-Cooled Supercomputers

Explore Greentech Media (Jun 23 2009) Power and Cooling , Carbon Footprint , Servers

The computing giant is researching lithium-air batteries, a technology with much promise but many challenges for commercial applications. Also in the works is a supercomputer cooled with water at the chip level – something IBM says could apply to broader data center cooling. IBM is busy looking for ways to make lithium-air batteries with 10 times the storage capacity of their lithium-ion cousins, and it has a Swiss supercomputer being cooled with water at the chip level – the technology could find its way into cooling data center servers and other IT equipment. Both projects announced Tuesday represent moves by the computing giant to get into more energy-efficient pastures, so to speak. In the case of its water-cooled supercomputer, IBM is hoping to find more efficient ways to cool the IT equipment. The equipment takes up about 2 percent of the world's energy. The project with the Swiss Federal Institute of ... (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   IBM

Greener IT: Save Money and the Environment

Explore Greentech Media (Jun 17 2009) Monitoring , Emissions

Ken Gonzalez, group product manager, Symantec Global Services, lays out the case for green IT. In today's business world, green IT is no longer an abstract or fringe topic. Executives are looking into greener IT because energy costs are such a large ... (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   United Kingdom   LEED

Ice Energy, Data Aire Team Up for Data Center Cooling

Explore Greentech Media (Jun 8 2009) Power and Cooling , Emissions , Servers

Ice Energy, the makers of air conditioning units that make ice at night when power is cheap and then use it for cooling on hot afternoons when power is most expensive, is getting into the data center cooling market with data center air conditioning company Data Aire. The two companies announced their partnership Monday, calling it a safe and cost-effective way for data centers to tackle peak cooling power loads. That could be a selling point for data center operators that want to earn some extra money by signing on to utility demand response programs. Those programs ask customers to cut down on power use during peak load times, something data centers would likely be loath to do. Ice Energy has been aiming its air conditioning systems toward commercial clients. Energy efficient AC systems are supported by incentives from California utilities Southern California Edison and Pacific Gas and Electric Co ... (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   The Green Grid

Symantec Report: Green IT Now 'Essential Item'

Explore Greentech Media (May 27 2009) Carbon Footprint , Cloud Computing , Servers

A survey of more than 1,000 high-level IT leaders from companies in North America, Europe, Asia and Latin America shows that nearly three-quarters are increasing budgets to make IT less power-hungry. The global green IT revolution has arrived. That's the gist of a March survey of more than 1,000 corporate IT leaders in North America, Europe, Asia and Latin America by computer security and data center optimization company Symantec. Companies around the world are spending more on making data centers and other IT operations more energy efficient, and IT departments are increasingly taking the lead in overall corporate green efforts, the survey found. Compared to surveys from years past, the results show that "Green IT is now an essential line item, whereas before it was something to be tackled later," said Jose Iglesias, vice president of global solutions at Symantec. The proof? Nearly three-quarters of those surveyed ... (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   United Kingdom

Greentech's Top Ten Acquisition Targets

Explore Greentech Media (May 13 2009) Solar , Wind

Who will get bought next in greentech? Darned if I know, but here's a semi-educated guess. Bonus: There's also a list of the four that won't likely be bought. Corporate acquisitions are tough to predict. But they're a lot of fun to talk about. Will General Electric snap up Southwest Windpower to get into small wind turbines, or will it buy Trinidad and Tobago as a nice vacation spot for its executives? Will Cisco buy SmartSynch and only to realize it thought it was buying Silver Spring? Can Suntech make a rock bigger than it can lift? The green technology world should probably brace for a wave of mergers. Funding is down, large multinationals want to get in the market, and many of the early startups are probably realizing that building a sales and distribution channel is tough. (Read Full Article)

Comment Mentions:   Google   IBM   eBay