Problems concerning the preservation of the environment have seen considerable publicity and an increase in public awareness at the global level: climactic disturbances, the hole in the ozone layer, Al Gore’s film “An Inconvenient Truth”, “Grenelle de l’Environnement” in France, ever more international conferences on the subject… The result is a far greater awareness of the problem on the public’s part.

The involvement of companies in environmental solutions is also becoming increasingly important. Corporate information technology, a production tool that has become essential to business, cannot escape the scrutiny: according to Gartner, IT is responsible for more carbon dioxide emissions than air transport.

Many companies have come to understand the importance and the challenges of implementing an IT strategy that is kinder to the environment.

What is Green IT?

Green IT (or “Green Computing”) covers a variety of policies aimed at limiting the impact of IT on the environment. Several aspects must be taken into account: compliance of equipment with environmental standards, use, storage, recycling…. but also the legislative framework, ethics, and helping the end user to be more aware.
This “Eco Responsible” policy is aimed at reducing energy consumption and limiting carbon footprint, ideally over the whole life cycle of the company’s IT infrastructure.

A brief history of Green IT

Green IT is part of a wider policy for sustainable development. The concept of sustainable development, introduced in 1987, marks the beginning of thinking about a new kind of development: “development which responds to the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to respond to theirs”.

The application of the idea of sustainable development by companies is called Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). The implication is that the enterprise should concern itself not just with profitability and its own growth, but also with the social and environmental effects of its activities.

The beginnings of Green IT appeared with the first examples of environmental standards awarded to products that have a reduced impact on the environment.

One of the first key moments in Green computing came with the launching of the Energy Star label in 1992. The certificate was intended to promote the reduction of energy consumption and of greenhouse gas emissions. Set up in the US, at the beginning it covered hard drives and monitors and was extended later to other office equipment and even to buildings. Other countries, particularly those within the European Union, have adopted this American standard, which continues to be highly relevant today.

Since 2004, we have seen a marked acceleration in Green IT initiatives. According to the Gartner Group, Green IT was in the top 10 of strategic technologies in 2008.

The increasing commitment on the part of enterprises to more ecological IT goes hand in hand with the concerns of CSR. Green IT is just one of the aspects of the developments that will be necessary for the future of the company and the planet. Every field of the Bank’s action and interaction must be examined through the lens of sustainable development.

Useful links
L’Atelier BNP Paribas regularly writes on green environment