Cloud computing reduces greenhouse emissions

Jonathan Koomey, of Stanford University has announced that cloud computing, “is significantly more energy efficient than using in-house data centres.”Not only is cloud computing more secure, cost-effective and simple than in house data storage, it could also help reduce carbon emissions on a large scale.

David Jacobowitz, Green Engineering and Operation Manager at Gmail says that since it replaced traditional email businesses are up to 80 times more energy efficient than in house email. This is because cloud based systems are usually housed in ultra efficient data centres which are built especially to deal with the data. He illustrates this by giving the example of several computer servers at different small businesses, all running at well under capacity. The work these servers are doing could be done by just one efficient server in a cloud data server, saving masses of energy.

Similarly, cloud media services like Youtube also have low energy usage compared to media stored on a company’s computer. Jacobowitz says three straight days of watching the website are equivalent to the production of 1 dvd in emissions (approximately 3kg).

This being said, it is important for these organisations like Google to drive down emissions further. They are still massive emitters of carbon dioxide and investment in further energy saving technologies like environmentally friendly server cooling is important to make ICT more sustainable.