Scotland's Digital Future: Scottish Public Sector Green ICT Strategy

Data Centre - Consolidation

Aberdeen University, Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen College and Banff & Buchan College.

Existing data centre facilities across all four institutions inadequate for future requirements, and unsustainable based on existing performance.

Introduce a shared service approach to data centres, backed by energy efficient design (North East of Scotland Shared Data Centre).

Carbon emissions reduced by 1,400 tonnes per annum (£250K per annum).

• First Prize (Public Sector category) Computer Weekly European User Awards.
• Data Centre Project of the year, Computing UK.

http://www.abdn.ac.uk/news/5455/

St Andrews University.

• Existing data centre facilities inadequate for future requirements.
• University wide drive to be carbon neutral for energy supply by 2016.

• Reduce data centres from 50 to 2 (including increased virtualisation).
• Enhanced detailed telemetry to facilitate a high degree of component optimisation.

• 30% reduction in energy (total annual savings over £61,000 per annum).

• BCS CEEDA Gold award
• Corporate Participant in European Code of Conduct on Data Centres ( EUCOC).
• The design was used for the development of the BREEAM datacentre scheme.

http://www.gov.scot/Resource/0046/00465172.pdf

Bassetlaw District Council, Derbyshire.

• Council wide issue that the available electricity supply capacity was limiting future expansion of all electronic services.

• Reduce the number of its physical servers from thirty-six to four.

• Air conditioning running costs reduced by 25%
• Electricity bills reduced by £10,000 pa (equating to carbon savings of c. 11 tonnes).

• Principles adopted by other Local Authorities (e.g. Doncaster Metropolitan Borough Council)

http://www.ukauthority.com/GreenICT/GreeningcouncilICTexamples/tabid/84/Default.aspx#

Data Centre - Virtualisation

Sheffield Hallam University

Excessive server count leading to space and outage problems.

Replace 120 physical servers with 300 'virtual' servers.

• More services for less cost - £2500 saving on hardware each time a virtual machine is deployed.
• Better server utilisation (50-70% versus an average of 5% for physical servers).
• 20% saving in energy consumption.

http://www.susteit.org.uk/cases/short-case-studies.php

City of Leeds Council

Data centre review resulted in excessive sever count.

"Virtualise" 138 servers to 10 severs.

Carbon emissions reduced by 767 tonnes per year.

http://www.ukauthority.com/GreenICT/GreeningcouncilICTexamples/tabid/84/Default.aspx#

Data Centre - Cooling

Fife Council

Existing air conditioning in data centres is 10 years old and does not take into account significant developments in cooling over time.

Redesign the layout of racks to reduce the amount of cooling required (switch to "cold isle" layouts and introduce a "free cooling" system to filter cold air from outside the building).

Electricity bills reduced by £42,000 per annum (equating to carbon savings of 135 tonnes per year).

http://www.gov.scot/Topics/Economy/digital/digitalservices/greenict

Print Reduction

Department For Work and Pensions

Unsustainable printing costs and energy usage in printing.

Introduce a managed print service - 30,000 legacy printers replaced with 8,200 energy star rated multifunctioning devices.

Electricity consumption reduced by 63%.

Financial savings via default double-sided printing.

Help desk calls halved (and 90% reduction in the number of site visits by engineers to deal with faulty printers).

Green ICT Awards Public Sector Project of the year, 2011.

http://news.xerox.co.uk/news/green-it-award-goes-to-the-department-208377

Desktop Video Conferencing Integration

Natural Environment Research Council

Unsustainable costs resulting from travel to meetings.

High-level commitment at CEO level to reduce the CO ₂ emissions.

Installation of high definition desktop video conference equipment.

Carbon emissions reduced by c. 15 tonnes (equating to £32,000 per annum)

Reduction in travelling times (and thus staff costs) of equating to c. 1,400 hours per annum.

http://www.gov.scot/Resource/0046/00465173.pdf

Thin Client Terminals

Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh

Unsustainable running costs of existing desktop PC's.

Replace standard desktops with 1,250 thin client terminals.

• Longer refresh periods (typically 8 years versus 4 years for desktops).
• Provision of natural ventilation and heating in buildings due to reduction in heat produced by thin client terminals.
• Annual electricity consumption to power thin clients reduced by £50K per annum).
• Annual electricity consumption to ventilate buildings reduced by £60K per annum.

• Green Business Awards 2011, Highly Commended, Energy Efficiency Category.
• Green Gown Award 2011, Highly Commended.

Automated Power Management

Employee Behaviour

Staffordshire County Council

Desk top PCs being left on overnight leading to unnecessary costs.

Used software that:

• automatically shut down PCs at the end of the day;
• track which PCs were left on when the programme is run and send automated reminder to users.

Cost savings over £40,000 per year.

http://www.ukauthority.com/GreenICT/GreeningcouncilICTexamples/tabid/84/Default.aspx

University of Liverpool

• Reduction in PCs being on standby from twenty hours per day to less than one;
• Cost saving of more than £30,000 per year (equivalent to £70 p/a per PC).

http://www.datasynergy.co.uk/casestudies/liverpool.aspx