More companies are logging on to green IT

There is greening of IT in large enterprises and companies are increasingly taking the environ- mental impact of their operations into consideration, says a recently released report. More Green Progress in Enterprise IT has been brought out by Forrester Research, a market research company. The report was based on a survey of 738 companies. The survey found out that environmental concerns were ?very important? for over 40% of the respondents.

Globally, companies attach importance to environmental concerns like energy efficiency and equipment recycling and in planning their IT operations today. ?There has been a remarkable increase for environment concerns while planning company?s IT operations, that is, last year it was 35% and this year it has reached 41%,? notes the report.

Vendors have a major role in further spreading the green promotional message (green IT in the design, operation, and/or disposal of their products). This percentage has almost doubled in the last one year (from 15% in April 2007 to 37% in April 2008), adds the Forrester report.

Creation of a comprehensive document or action plan, which details the goals, priorities and activities that the company will undertake can help in greening. One of the highest impact changes a company can make is to put green criteria into its evaluation and purchasing process for IT equipment, says the report.

The survey finds out that several industries are leading the implementation of green IT through their procurement process. These include high-tech utilities and public sector organisations, which include governments, educational institutions and non-governmental organisations.

E-waste recycling is well established in the IT sector. Four out of five companies have IT equipment recycling programmes in place. These companies are predominantly using third party recycling providers often in combination with the system manufacturer, says the report.

What makes companies move towards green IT? Is it part of their corporate responsibility strategy or is there more to it? Green motivations mainly range from reduction in energy-related operating expenses, doing the right thing for the environment and aligning IT with a corporate green initiative. Other motivations include alignment with corporate sustainability to reduce IT operating expenses and bottom-up rationales (reducing energy or other operating expenses or improving the reliability of IT infrastructure), found out the survey.

The report says that green IT can be more than an initiative to improve the efficiency and reduce the environmental impact of a company?s computing operations. It can also be a way for IT leaders and organisations to gain strategic influence by acting as an enabler for improving the environmental footprint of other business operations beyond the IT infrastructure per se. If organisations go for videoconferencing to reduce business travel, work-at-home to reduce commuting and automation to reduce energy requirement, it can bring about big changes in protecting the green surroundings.

The biggest challenge for vendors is to effectively reach the customers that are environmentally conscious. They can overcome the challenge of creating products and services by positioning in such a fashion that it resonates with target customer segments based on the geographical and industrial variation, notes the report.