Page 114 -

5: The Magic of “Incentive”—The Role of Electric Utilities 79

can monitor and manage the use of energy in the data center. Guidelines such
as EPEAT tool are starting to provide those energy ratings for the data center.
EPEAT and other IT energy-efficiency rating schemes are discussed next.
As discussed in Chapter 4, “The Government’s Role—Regulation and
EPA Activity,” in the summer of 2008, the EPA was required to report to
Congress national estimates for energy consumption by data centers, along
with recommendations for reducing its energy consumption. That is one of
several ways lawmakers are looking to soften the environmental impact of
computing. The use of voluntary guidelines is only a start on the road to our
environmental revolution. However, two forthcoming guidelines embraced
by U.S. regulators, combined with tough laws from the European Union on
hazardous materials, could go a long way toward forcing green computing
onto businesses.
Let’s start with the Electronic Product Environmental Assessment
Tool (EPEAT). Bush’s directive to use EPEAT for government buying guar-
antees that these standards will get some traction. But businesses will likely
find them useful when they need an effective argument for buying green.
EPEAT was developed over the past three years by 100 stakeholders, includ-
ptg
ing electronics manufacturers, with funding from an EPA grant. These stan-
dards cover only PCs and monitors today but will likely be extended to
servers, routers, printers, and maybe even cell phones.
The standards dictate 23 required criteria and 28 optional criteria for IT
vendors covering eight broad categories, including energy conservation, recy-
cling or disposal, packaging, and reduction or elimination of dangerous
materials such as PVC, mercury, and lead. Some 350 products from 14 ven-
dors are EPEAT-compliant, though none at the highest gold rating. EPEAT’s
energy-consumption criteria are based on the EPA’s ENERGY STAR require-
ments for PCs, and the sensitive-material criteria require companies to meet
the European Union’s tough standards for limiting the hazardous chemicals
and components used to make them.
The ENERGY STAR ratings on PCs are just like those on refrigerators
and washing machines. The PC ratings were enhanced in July 2008, when
the EPA issued new, more demanding specs for energy efficiency of PCs and
high-end CAD/CAM workstations. PC energy-savings can make a difference
to companies. For example, Union Bank of California expects to reduce its
energy costs 10 percent to 12 percent annually just by buying more energy-
efficient PCs. The EPA has also developed tests to compare energy consump-
tion of different servers and is expected to make those methods available at
the beginning of 2009.