Healthy climate with Green IT

T-Systems is acting responsibly. With environmentally friendly technology, the ICT service provider is reducing energy consumption, both at the company and at its customers. That is Green IT.

The slogan is currently being brought to the media within the scope of the international "Green IT" ad campaign: Servers that consume greens? Not exactly. In the ads, the plants that Dr. Ralf Bündgen, the environmental officer at T-Systems, is feeding the servers are only symbolic. However, T-Systems is the first company worldwide to continuously test a biogas-operated fuel cell near Munich to be used at data centers. Power there is generated by environmentally friendly biogas, which occurs on the basis of forage crops. Instead of using an air conditioning system, a machine transforms the waste heat from the cell into cold air so that the room temperature remains stable and the electricity bill is cut almost in half. But this is just one feature of Green IT, the topic that market researchers at Gartner have listed as a top trend for 2008.

IT like power and water

The strategy for environmentally conscious information technology at T-Systems: The company is reducing its own energy consumption and enabling its customers to do the same with intelligent solutions. For example, the Telekom subsidiary increasingly uses blade servers to reduce its energy consumption. These servers use some components jointly or disconnect component groups from the power supply when they are not in use. In order to better utilize the servers, the company combines them and uses them to independently manage computer processes. Experience with Dynamic Services at T-Systems shows that this improved use of computer capacity and storage can save between 60 and 80 percent of the capacities used. Customers can access computer capacity, data storage, software and bandwidth flexibly from the network on demand just like power and water.

Climate-friendly video conferencing

The high-quality video conferencing solution by the Telekom subsidiary also helps customers run their businesses in an environmentally friendly manner. At Telekom for example, over 40,000 of these virtual meetings have already been held. Thanks to the fact that participants no longer have to travel, over 7,000 tons of carbon dioxide have been prevented from entering the atmosphere. This is approximately the amount that 1,000 light bulbs would emit if they burned 8 years straight without stopping.