1. Introduction
Global warming, climate
change and their associated impact on the existence of human civilization are
crucial in the present world. With the advent of development, industrialization
and its eventual energy consumption are growing enormously with a rate far
beyond our expectation. This lead to emission of GHG (Green House Gases) that
is primarily responsible for global warming and climate change. In this
process, the concept of green technology is gaining its necessity for environmental
sustainability. Energy preservation along with low carbon emission has become
compelling challenges for industries and organizations. ICT plays an integral
role in reducing harmful environmental effect of other industries. Although ICT
is deployed to’ green’ the technology, as an industry, ICT itself is responsible
for significant adverse impact on the environment. Wide application of online services,
social networking, e mailing and other web based activities lead to extensive deployment
of cloud hosting that caters for several data centers all around the globe. These
data centers are massive power user and very often consume more power than the
cities they are located in. So data center deployment decision is driven by
availability of cheap electrical power and or a natural means of cooling.
Recent studies found that carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from data centers
alone surpass emissions from many individual countries (note that this does not
include CO2 emissions from other global ICT infrastructure) (Yousif, 2009).
Moreover, ICT equipment contains toxic substances such as lead and mercury,
much of which enters the environment as e waste. Diverse and extensive
footprint of ICT demands for comprehensive efforts by researchers, technologists,
developers, consumers and politicians for green and sustainable ICT. A wide
range of initiatives, like, deployment of energy efficient resources and
equipment, involving virtualization and autonomic power optimization,
developing lower-voltage equipment, increased integration (system-on-a chip),
power-aware ICT (both hardware and software), and motivation of end user for
energy conservation can ensure green ICT. Using advanced cooling technology and
power generation equipment along with adoption of physical layout to reduce external/internal
heat and optimizing physical placement of resources can improve the efficiency
of ICT operation to a greater extent.
2. The concept of Green
ICT
Green ICT, or sustainable
ICT, is a recently emerged topic that addresses the role of ICT for achieving
Sustainable development goals. Green ICT is the study and practice of environmentally
sustainable computing or IT. It aims to make the overall impact of ICT, clear, environmentally
sustainable and positive through decreasing resource intensity and encouraging
resource consuming lifestyles. To San Murugesan, it includes designing, manufacturing,
using, and disposing of computers, servers, and associated subsystems such as monitors,
printers, storage devices, and networking and communications systems —
efficiently and effectively with minimal or no impact on the environment. It is
evident that ICT has the vast potential to innovate climate safe technology for
other
* Divisional Engineer,
Bangladesh Telecommunications Company Limited
WORLD TELECOMMUNICATION AND INFORMATION SOCIETY DAY
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It is evident that ICT has
the vast potential to innovate climate safe technology for other industries.
But at present, the overwhelming challenge of ICT sector’s own emission needs to
be addressed. Innovations in green solutions in telecommunication networks
(e.g. converged, flatter and highly integrated network), energy preservation,
smart cooling technologies, software development for power conservation and
deployment of high efficiency equipment contribute to environment friendly
green ICT. If such green ICT can be combined with other technologies to reduce
their emission it can lead to greener solutions. However, reducing carbon emissions
will require changes in lifestyle and behavior, but changes in management practices
and policy initiatives can also have a positive impact. Green ICT can help,
either directly, by reducing the ICT sector’s own energy requirements; or
indirectly through using ICTs for carbon displacement, or in a systemic way, by
providing the technology to implement and monitor carbon reductions in other
economic sectors. For example, studies show that monitoring and control using
ICT can reduce energy use in buildings by up to 17 % and reduce carbon
footprint in transport logistics by up to 27 %. With smart power networks it is
possible to control electricity consumption dynamically, resulting in energy
savings and more efficient investments. Smart electricity meters which provide consumers
with information about energy use can reduce consumption as well as network operators’
energy losses.
3.1 ICT and environment
It is estimated that ICT as
an industry contributes to around 2% to 2.5% of GHG emissions every year.
Manufacturing of ICT products, their use (energy use and cooling method), disposal,
all steps are associated with massive carbon footprint and emission of toxic
material to the environment that are not bio degradable. Moreover, the ICT
sector’s emissions are expected to increase to nearly double – to about 4% – by
2020 (SMART 2020
report, 2008). ICT is
changing its attribute rapidly and a wide variety of gadgets are added for the consumers.
2010 has been addressed by many in ICT sector as ‘Year of Cloud’. Arrival of
iPad, growth in netbooks and other tablet computers lead to extensive use of
cloud hosting technology. It accounts for massive power consumptions through
numerous datacenters. Google is perhaps the most famous cloud-based company to
demonstrate the potential of a cloud platform to drive a hugely successful
business model. All of Google’s signature products - Gmail, Google Documents
and Google Earth - are delivered from the cloud. Its ambitious project to
create a digital library will be entirely hosted by servers storing most of the
world’s published work, all in digitized form (Greenpeace report, 2010).
Millions of consumers access the ‘cloud’ to use social networks, watch stream
video, download music, books, and check mail. Facebook, Flickr and Picasa also
involve clouds for storing thousands of digital photos online.
3.2 Cloud Hosting and
its impact on environment
The term cloud, or cloud
computing, used as a metaphor for the internet, is based on an infrastructure
and business model whereby - rather than being stored on user’s own device - data,
entertainment, news and other products and services are delivered to user’s
device, in real time, from the internet. With the growth of the cloud comes an
increasing demand for energy. Unfortunately, the cloud is growing at a time
when climate change and reducing emission from energy use is a paramount
concern. Cloud computing deploys data centers to cater massive storage that
consume tremendous amounts of energy. The companies rarely seek for a green
power source to fuel these data centers. For instance, Facebook, in 2010 commissioned
a new data centre in Oregon and committed to a
power service provider agreement with Pacific Corp, a utility that gets the
majority of its energy from coal-fired power stations, the United States Buffalo , New York
WORLD TELECOMMUNICATION AND
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reduces its carbon footprint.
So if truly green cloud is to be provided, the cloud providers must drive
investments near renewable energy sources. In addition, they must be involved
in setting the policies that will drive rapid deployment of renewable electricity
generation economy-wide, and place greater R&D into storage devices that
will deliver electricity from renewable sources 24/7.
3.3 Projection of Carbon
footprint of ICT industries
SMART 2020 Report issued by
The Climate Group and the Global e-Sustainability Initiative (GeSI) in 2008,
reveals that
• PC ownership will quadruple
between 2007 and 2020 to 4 billion devices, and emissions will double over the
same period, with laptops overtaking desktops as the main source of global ICT
emissions (22%).
• Mobile phone ownership will
almost double to nearly 5 billion accounts by 2020, but emissions will only
grow by 4%. Broadband uptake will treble to almost 900 million accounts over
the same period, with emissions doubling over the entire telecoms infrastructure.
SMART report also predicts the carbon footprint of ICT industries itself that
is depicted in table 1. However, the ICT sector has high potential to emission
reductions five times the size of the sector’s own footprint, up to 7.8 GtCO2e,
or 15% of total BAU (business as Usual) emissions by 2020 (SMART 2020 report,
2008). The study posits that innovation form the ICT sector, combined with
increased use of renewable energy can put the world on a more sustainable path
and help keep global temperature rise below 2°C threshold [3].
4.1 Initiatives for
green ICT
Initiatives for green ICT are
comprehensive efforts by ICT industry, environment preserving agencies,
different governments, and International organizations, like, ITU.
Nevertheless, the consumer lifestyle should also be green ICT compliant. Such
initiative first started far back in 1992 with energy star logo. US Environment
protection agency started this voluntary labeling program to promote and
recognize energy efficiency in computer monitors, climate control equipment and
other environment friendly technologies. It yields widespread adoption of sleep
mode in consumer electronics. Concurrently, the Swedish organization TCO Development
launched the TCO Certification program to promote low magnetic and electrical
emissions from CRT-based computer displays. Murugesan, in 2008, devised four layouts
to address the adverse effect of computing on environment: Green use, green
disposal, green design, and green manufacturing. Green computing can develop
solutions by "aligning all IT processes and practices with the core
principles of sustainability, which are to reduce, reuse, and recycle; and
finding innovative ways to use IT in business processes to deliver
sustainability benefits across the enterprise and beyond"[1]. It should incorporate
end user satisfaction, management restructuring, regulatory compliance, and
return on investment (ROI).
4.2 Industries to
address green ICT
Various Industries came into
operation for greening the ICT. The leading industries in this field are
Climate Savers Computing Initiatives (CSCI), The Green Electronics Council, The
Green Grid, Green Comm. Challenge, Transaction Process Performance Council
Table 1: Projection of Carbon footprint of ICT industries
Emission
2007 (Mt CO2e)
Percentage
2007
Emission
2020 (Mt CO2e)
Percentage 2020
World 830 100% 1430 100%
Server farms/Data
centers 116 14% 257 18%
Telecommunication
infrastructure and
Devices
307 37% 358 25%
PCs and Peripherals 407 49% 815 57%
WORLD TELECOMMUNICATION AND INFORMATION SOCIETY DAY
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(TPC), Spec Power etc. Among
them, CSCI, established in 2007, aims to reduce the electric power consumption
of PCs in active and inactive states. It provides a catalog of green products
from its member organizations. WWF is also a member of the computing
initiatives. The Green Electronics Council assists the purchase of ‘greener’ computing
systems through Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool (EPEAT).
Products are rated Gold, Silver, or, Bronze, depending on the number of optional
criteria they meet to measure products efficiency and sustainability
attributes. The Green Grid, a global consortium, founded in 2007, is dedicated
to advancing energy efficiency in data centers and business computing
ecosystems. Its main focus is improving datacenter infrastructure efficiency.
The founding key companies of green grid are AMD, APC, Dell, HP, IBM, Intel,
Microsoft, Sun Microsystems etc. Apart from ICT companies green grid
incorporates hundreds of members including end-users and governments
organizations. SPEC Power is the first industry standard benchmark to measure
the power consumption in relation to performance for server-class computers.
4.3 Green Computing
methods
• Product longevity
Product longevity is central
for green computing. Product upgradability and modularity along with prolong
lifetime of equipments reduces the adverse environmental effect. For instance, manufacturing
a new PC contributes a greater footprint than manufacturing a new RAM. It is
seen that the PC manufacturing process accounts for seventy percent of the
natural resources used in the life cycle of a PC (Gartner, 2009). So up
gradation and modularity, instead of complete replacement of the equipment
should be the primary focus.
• Data center design
In 2010, between 1.1% and
1.5% of the world’s total energy use was consumed by the data centers. The U.S.
Department of Energy estimates that data center facilities consume up to 100 to
200 times more energy than standard office buildings. There is no alternative
to design energy efficient data centers. The U.S. Department of Energy identifies
five primary areas for energy efficient data centers:
• Information technology (IT)
systems
• Environmental conditions
• Air management
• Cooling systems
• Electrical systems
• On-site electrical
generation and recycling of waste heat. Emphasis should be given on space utilization,
software and deployment optimization, actual location, configuration and
construction of the building for energy efficient data center design. Larger
server centers should be located where land and energy are inexpensive and are
readily available. Moreover, local availability of renewable energy, climate
that allows outside air to be used for cooling, and locating them in a place
where the heat produced can be used for other purposes are key factors for
environment friendly site allocation. Data centers can potentially
improve their energy and
space efficiency through techniques such as storage consolidation and
virtualization. With the aid of a self-styled ultra efficient evaporative cooling
technology, Google Inc. has been able to reduce its energy consumption to 50% of
that of the industry average.
• Algorithmic efficiency
Algorithmic efficiency
determines the amount of computer resources required for any given computing
functions. For instance, switching from a slow (linear) search algorithm to a
fast (hashed or indexed) search algorithm can reduce resource usage substantially.
A study by a physicist at Harvard, estimated that the average Google search
released seven grams of carbon dioxide (CO_) (Fox news, 2009). Google, however,
argued that a typical search produces only 0.2 grams of CO_ (official
Google blog, 2009).
• Resource Allocation
Another effective way for
increasing efficiency is resource allocation. Allocation
WORLD TELECOMMUNICATION AND
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Algorithms, for example, can
be used to route traffic to data centers where electricity is less expansive or
produced in a more environment friendly way. However, this technique does not
reduce energy usage rather cut down the energy cost of the company or ensures
utilization of environment friendly energy sources.
• Virtualizing
Computer virtualization
refers to abstraction of computer resources; a process where two or more
logical computer systems are run in one set of physical hardware. So a system administrator
can integrate several physical systems into virtual machines on one single, powerful
system thereby unplugging the original hardware and reducing power and cooling
consumption.
• Terminal servers
With terminal servers the
users at the terminals are connected to central server where all the computing
is performed but the user experiences the operating system in the terminal. It
can be combined with thin client that uses about one eighth of the energy of a
normal workstation thereby reducing energy consumption and cost.
• Power management
Reducing power usage is
central for green computing. The Advanced Configuration and Power Interface
(ACPI), an open industry standard, allows a system to automatically turn-off
components such as monitors and hard drives after set periods of inactivity. In
addition, a system may hibernate, when most components, including the CPU and
System RAM, are turned off. Intel processor offers ‘Speed Step’ to regulate its
voltages supplied depending on the workload. This voltage regulation is also
called ‘under volting’ that allows the CPU to adjust its voltage supply thereby
reducing electricity consumption and heat production.
5.1 Green Initiatives in
Telecommunication Networks
Apart from above techniques a
more integrated effort is required in the telecommunication networks to reduce
the Carbon footprint of the ICT industries. It requires combined drive by the
vendors and the telecommunication operators. Innovation in green technology can
be divided into two parts: 1) Network Architecture level, and 2) Network
Element level. The first one refers to optimize organization of network
elements, and the second one incorporates green technology in equipment level,
board level, and chipset level. Hence, Network Architecture innovation has the
potential to save 60%-80% power consumption. The network elements, on the other
hand must be environmental friendly to support the network Architecture level Figure1.
Power Saving Innovations [2] Power Saving and reduced energy consumption are
primary concerns of green ICT. Network Architecture determines the scale of
network energy consumptions. To optimize the network for reduced power
consumption, emphasis is given on three levels of network: Access Network:
Innovative wireless access architecture of C-RAN and green FTTx for fixed
broadband. Core Network and Data centers: innovative architecture for data
centers for converged core networks. Transport Network: A converged and flatter
architecture for power saving.
5.2.1 Access Network
green solutions
• C-RAN for wireless
network Innovations
Network Deployment strategy
with ‘large capacity, fewer site rooms’ can provide a greener and lower cost
network for operators [2]. C-RAN for wireless network can be a very
WORLD TELECOMMUNICATION
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effective technique for green
innovation. It includes centralized processing, collaborative radio, real time
cloud computing infrastructure, and is environmentally clean system. In C-RAN
RRU (Remote Radio Unit) is separated form BBU (Baseband Unit). RRUs are
naturally cooled components that can be installed on outdoor/rooftop/pole and
they can be connected to a set of BBUs in the central office via CPRI interface
over optical fiber. So C-RAN architecture removes the requirement of site rooms
and associated A/C in BTS sites. In addition, RRUs with high receiver
sensitivity deployed closer to the antenna can save transmitter power thereby
increasing the capacity of C-RAN based BTS/NodeB. Moreover BBU Pool offers
converged network with higher network capacity. Figure 2: Typical C-RAN Deployment
Topology vs. Traditional RAN Mode [2]
• FTTx : Green access
innovation for fixed network
Development and convergence
of core network demands for reduced access network complexity. In this process,
PSTN, NGN and broadband access networks based on DSLAMs have converged into an
FTTx network architecture that not only reduces access network complexity and
but also cost. FTTx deploys larger capacity converged OLT sites that require
reduced number of switches. Such Flatter network leads to decreased energy
consumption. Figure 3: FTTx network for multi access network convergence[2]
5.2.2 Converged Core
Network and Innovative Datacenter for power saving
Core network comprises a wide
variety of network elements and equipment for data storage, service provision
etc. So, converged, energy efficient data centers to provide core network functionality
is the key element for energy saving. Data centers with bladed and virtualized
IT accounts for lower server energy consumption. In addition, innovation in
cooling system leads to further reduction of energy usage. For instance,
‘liquid cooling system’ with the cooling system to be located as close as possible
to the main heat generation source, and ‘accurate winding’ that directs cool
air to the server heat generating parts, reduce substantial energy usage.
5.2.3 Converged and
Flatter Transport Network for Power Saving
The traditional transport
layer comprises core layer, aggregation layer, and access layer. Innovation in
Green technology omits the aggregation layer and the elements of core layer are
directly connected to access layer thereby reducing the number of equipment required.
In this flatter network, Aggregation equipment links, ports, routing and room space
is reduced considerably leading to a power saving of as high as thirty percent.
Nonetheless, it reduces cooling requirement, lessens network delay and jitter.
5.3 Green Technology in
Network Elements
Network elements green
technology involves greening in three levels: equipment level, board level, and
chipset level.
WORLD TELECOMMUNICATION AND
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5.3.1 Equipment level
green solutions
With the popularity and huge
demand of wireless technology, mobile operators experience tremendous energy
need to deploy different technologies (GSM/WCDMA/LTE) with multiple frequency resources
(900m/1800m/2100m). SDR based wireless solution is a green initiative that supports
multiple technologies and frequencies in the same equipment platform. Another
prime way to reduce energy consumption is to reduce number of base stations,
especially in low traffic cases, for example, in rural areas. High sensitivity receiver
technology is a best solution in this regard. In rural areas, a 3dB increase
can increase the coverage radius by 22%, which means a 45% coverage increase
[2]. It, in the long run, reduces number of base station and their associated
energy consumption. Traffic volume in telecommunication network varies widely
ranging from business hours to non-busy hours. RNC equipment technology can
meet this criterion to optimize energy consumption through automatic and dynamic
power control of equipment. Some boards with RNC functionality goes to sleep mode
during low traffic volume and wakes up in business hours. Vendors introduce new
equipment for base stations that adopt a wide range of operating temperature
ranging from -10_ to +55 _. It reduces the dependency on air-conditioning thereby reducing
energy consumption. In the fixed networks, transition from copper cable to
fiber in the form of FTTx offers extensive reduction of energy by increasing more
passive components in the network. This equipment also utilizes dynamic power control
methods for reduced energy usage. Advanced system architecture to reduce redundancy,
low power routers, effective thermal design, introducing sub-regional power
supplies within equipment, and using highly integrated equipment are additional
features of equipment green solutions. In addition, introduction of fan-less
dual layer sub-rack architecture in equipment level results in extensive power
saving.
5.3.2 Board Level Green
Solutions
To reduce the number of base
stations, and power usage, in the board level, the efficiency of power
amplifier is increased considerably. Flexible resource allocation technique
allows provision of baseband pool where all boards are controlled and monitored
by the control module. The more the number of boards are on the pool the more power
saving they provide. In wireless networks, with the ease of intelligent
timeslot technology, during low traffic all the active user time slots can be consolidated
to smaller number of timeslots and unused timeslots are shut down. Board density
is increased by using more integrated chipset that provides multiple
functionality on the same board. It reduces number of service cards and power
usage.
5.3.3 Chipset level
green solutions
One challenge in increasing
power amplifier (PA) efficiency is that the efficiency is maximized at full
output power and declines at lower outputs. But the equipment not always runs
on full output. Green dynamic power technology is introduced that tracks the
real time workload and adjusts the PA supply voltage accordingly. Thus
efficiency is optimized in lower outputs as well. Moreover, ‘green’ chip set
are developed with energy efficiency, high integration, sleep-mode capability,
and provision of multi voltage operation for dynamic power control.
5.4 Green Solutions for
Auxiliary facilities
Power efficiency in power
transformer modules, intelligent cooling system and high efficiency environment
friendly battery system along with green energy are necessary for a complete green
Telecommunication network. The vendors now stress on use of renewable energy in
the form of pure solar, hybrid solar and oil, hybrid wind and solar energy
solutions etc. These
energy schemes can be
customized depending on the availability of resources, and scale of economy of
the customer. Innovation is required for green Battery
systems as well. For instance, Li-Iron batteries have many ‘green’ advantages over
lead-acid batteries that are widely used in traditional telecommunication
networks. Li-Iron Batteries are safer, more environment friendly, and have higher
working. temperatures.
6. Regulatory and Policy
Initiatives for Green ICT
It is evident that only
technical efforts are not sufficient for sustainable green ICT initiative. A generic
benchmark, universal solution, along with regulatory and policy initiatives are
essential that requires comprehensive efforts by the technologists,
researchers, end-users, telecommunication industries, environment
WORLD TELECOMMUNICATION AND
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specialists, international
organization and the governments around the globe, especially, from the
developed countries responsible for larger carbon footprint. ITU as an
International regulatory body takes several measures for green solutions. It deploys
wide range of recommendation in the form of green ICT standards and supplements.
For mobile terminals and other hand- held devices ITU recommends universal Power
adapters and charger solutions (ITU-T L.1000). Almost all the smart phones and tablets
now have same USB chargers. It reduces the number of power adapters and chargers
produced and recycled leading to a green ICT solutions. Similarly, ITU recommends
for External Universal Power Adapter solutions for stationary ICT devices (ITU-T
L.1001). Such universal devices widen their application in more devices, enable
their reuse, and increase their lifetime. It reduces the demand on raw
materials and limits the production of e-waste. In addition, ITU provides
information on recycling procedure for rare metals of ICT goods. ITU also
recommends Direct Current (DC) interface between the power feeding system and
ICT equipment connected to it. The specified interface is operated from a DC power
source of up to 400 V to allow increased power consumption and equipment power
density, in order to obtain higher energy efficiency and reliability with less
material usage than using a lower voltage such as -48 VDC or AC UPS power feeding
solutions (ITU-T L.1200). ITU suggests best practices for green data centers
and energy efficiency metrics and measurement methods for telecommunication
equipment. It also focuses on assessment of environmental impact of ICT goods,
networks, services, projects, ICT in organizations, cities, countries and group
of countries. It also provides methodology for assessment of such environmental
impact.
7. Conclusion
Green ICT is inevitable in
the present climate change scenario. The developed countries with extensive
technological growth are associated with large carbon footprint. Unfortunately,
the developing countries thriving for ICT penetration are mostly affected by
global warming. So it is the primary responsibility of the developed countries
to reduce carbon footprint. Invention and cost effective application of climate
safe ICT is an overwhelming challenges for ICT experts. Fortunately, Telecommunication
and ICT industries have started research and innovation for green ICT. Moreover,
ICT has the potential to reduce carbon emission of other industries substantially.
ICT must be green first. If this green ICT is applied to make other industries green
it will lead to a clean and green environment. It is evident that environmental
sustainability is prime concern for the development of mankind. With the
growing trend of technological advancement there is no alternative to opt for
green technology. Green ICT is a prime concern to obtain green technology. Only
technological innovation is not sufficient; Global policy framework to deploy
universal regulation and benchmark is a crying need. In addition, the end-users
must sensitize their adverse impact on environment through use of ICT. On the
other hand, Green ICT must be economically viable for practical application.
Awareness generation and government stimulus can play a vital role in this
regard. So an integrated effort is necessary by the researchers, technologists,
environment specialists, International bodies, and governments to meet this
global need.
References:
1. Donnellan, Brian and
Sheridan, Charles and Curry, Edward (Jan–Feb 2011). "A Capability Maturity
Framework for Sustainable Information and Communication Technology". IEEE
IT Professional 13 (1): 33–40.
2. “ZTE Green Technology
Innovations White paper”, ZTE Corporations, 2011.
3. “Make It Green-Cloud
Computing and its Contribution to Climate Change”, Greenpeace International,
March, 2010.
4. http://www.itu.int/en/ITU-T/climatechange/
Pages/standards.aspx
5.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_computing
