There has been a lot of political rhetoric on whether global warming and climate change is fact or fiction. There have been some interesting recent articles from reputable sources on the issue. Take a look…
That is what Rob Bernard, the chief environmental strategist for Microsoft, is projecting in his latest article in Sustainable Industries. Microsoft recently commissioned a study with Accenture to analyze the energy and greenhouse gas use for cloud-hosted systems such as Microsoft versus on their own hosted systems.
The study found that organizations could save energy and carbon by switching to the cloud. It found the smaller the organization, the larger the benefit. The study predicted an effective carbon footprint reduction of up to 90 percent over using local servers for smaller organizations (less than 100 people). For large corporations, the predicted savings were typically 30 percent or more. This is a pretty remarkable carbon and energy savings for smaller businesses.
In addition, cloud computing services can generally save companies money. It ranges from 25-50% savings in your IT costs. PC Computing has a nice article, 13 Terrific Cloud Services for Small Businesses, which provides an overview of companies that offer cloud based computing for small companies.
The reality is that global warming isn’t going away. We as a society can’t hide from it any longer. The U.S., along with China, is the largest global gas emitter in the world.
The question is what are you doing about it? Are you part of the solution or still contributing to the problem?
Each of us has the power to make a difference in the warming of the planet. The time to act is now! Commit to one step–one action, that will help reduce global warming.
If you haven’t read Thomas Friedman’s latest book, Hot, Flat and Crowded…you must get it and read it! Another well-written book by Friedman that explores the Environmental impact has on our Global economy and environment. I especially love the way explores all the effects global warming will have in every aspect of our lives, our economy, our globe.