22 Sep 2008

September 22, 2008

Whatever their long-term view ought to be, many people see the premium on green goods as discretionary, and among the first thing to be cut when times get tough. To take just one example, UK organic food sales are estimated to have slumped by a third in the last six months. But for datacentres, green could be the colour of survival.

Green storage is not just a tick in the box on the way to meeting corporate social responsibility targets. The many different technologies that fall under the green storage heading can all be used to rein in the datacentre’s fastest-growing overheads, and can help postpone the expansion or relocation of datacentre premises. It may even be the only approach that will enable companies to keep up with the ever-swelling flood of data, and thereby stay in business.

Last year Gartner warned that by the end of 2008, nearly 50% of datacentres worldwide would be facing increasing difficulties in finding the electricity they needed to power - and cool - their equipment. Even if they can find the power, organisations which currently spend 4-8% of their IT budgets on energy may find their costs rising as much as fourfold within the next five years.

Gartner research vice-president Rakesh Kumar says that …

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