[LINK] Green ICT ideas

[Tom Worthington]

stephen at melbpc.org.au wrote:
> ... ACS ... disseminate ... responsible green-ICT ...

The ACS included suggestions for green ICT, with the first Australian 
ICT carbon audit in 2007:
<http://www.acs.org.au/index.cfm?action=notice&temID=noticedetails&notID=774>.

The ACS then commissioned me to design a course on green ICT and 
allowed the material to be open access. See "Green Technology 
Strategies": <http://www.tomw.net.au/green/ebook.shtml>.

The ACS will be releasing a follow-up national ICT carbon audit in the 
next few weeks.

> For just one example, only today, the che roice of fonts ...
> 
> 'University Thinks the Right Font Could Help Save the Earth'
>  By ZAC BISSONNETTE Posted 8:53 AM 03/26/10 <www.dailyfinance.com> ...

While every little bit helps, I don't think changing the font used to
reduce ink usage should be a priority. Along with using a black
background for web pages to reduce energy use, this is one of those 
ideas which sounds appealing, but is of little practical value.

The place to start with green ICT is to use less equipment and use it
more effectively. As an example, I get my students to estimate energy
use of ICT in their organisations. One student discovered their 
organisation was using about ten times as much power as expected for 
printers. It turned out they had ten times as many printers as needed. 
Reducing the number of printers would have a much larger beneficial 
environmental effect, than changing the font used.

One technique to reduce printer and ink use is to print less. 
Educational institutions can distribute course material online and 
accept student assignments the same way. The green ICT courses I run for 
ANU and ACS (and next semester for Open Universities Australia) are 
online. There are no printed materials required and students submit 
their assignments electronically. This saves a paper and ink (as well as 
student travel), at the cost of increased electricity and computer 
materials use.


-- 
Tom Worthington FACS HLM, TomW Communications Pty Ltd. t: 0419496150
PO Box 13, Belconnen ACT 2617, Australia  http://www.tomw.net.au
Adjunct Lecturer, The Australian National University t: 02 61255694
Computer Science http://cs.anu.edu.au/user/3890