[LINK] Green fix for Digital Education Revolution budget

[Tom Worthington]

At the Australian Computers in Education Conference 2008 (ACEC'08), 
2pm tomorrow, Mark Winter will propose power saving measures for 
computers in schools 
<http://www.acec2008.info/confpapers/paperdetails.asp?pid=7522&docid=1096>. 
He claims that this can save enough on power bills to resolve the 
dispute between the state and federal governments on funding of the 
Digital Education Revolution program:

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     "... states can save upwards of 50%-70% off their PC power 
consumption, that in turn saves money and CO2 emissions". "The states 
can then use these savings to fund the installation of the new PC's 
being allocated to them through the Digital Education Revolution (DER)".

     "We know that the Rudd Government's "Digital Educational 
Revolution" Policy will change the way that the education of our 
youth is delivered, however at what cost". "With the promised $1.2 bn 
in funding, more schools will have access to more PCs than ever 
before. More PCs means more energy consumption, which means higher 
electricity bills and greater carbon emissions" Winter said.

     "NSW was allocated 74,838 PC's in round one of the DER and with 
this comes a power bill to run these PC's of around $4.6 million 
dollars per annum, so you can understand why Verity Firth, the NSW 
Education Minister is upset and is wanting clarification on who will 
be paying the ongoing costs associated with the scheme." Mark went onto say.

     "The NSW Education Minister has the ability to self fund the 
shortfall and can save $3.8 million in power consumption by mandating 
simple measures that all PC's within school are centrally shut down 
when not in use. This will not only have substantial savings for the 
states, allowing them to use these savings to fund the ongoing costs 
it will also assist with reducing Australia's carbon footprint", 
Winter concluded. ..."

     From: Australian Green IT initiative can resolve the federal 
governments funding crisis with the states around the Digital 
Education Revolution, Media Release, Computers Off Australia, 29 
October 2008: <http://www.computersoff.org/display.asp?id=126>
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ps: Hope this makes sense. It was my suggestion, as one of the 
advisers to the CoA campaign.



Tom Worthington FACS HLM tom.worthington at tomw.net.au Ph: 0419 496150
Director, Tomw Communications Pty Ltd            ABN: 17 088 714 309
PO Box 13, Belconnen ACT 2617                      http://www.tomw.net.au/
Adjunct Senior Lecturer, Australian National University