Cloud computing has hidden environmental costs because the technologies used to connect to it are highly energy inefficient, says a Jisc report.
The document from the university IT organisation's TechWatch service, Low carbon computing: A view to 2050 and beyond, says data storage and mounting capacity requirements will be a major test for university IT managers, but that cloud computing has hidden environmental costs.
Such costs are due to the high energy consumption of the network technologies used to connect to data clouds, the report says.
According to Jisc TechWatch, which examines how technology developments could affect higher and further education, the environmental benefits of cloud computing are dependent upon the greenhouse gas associated with the client and that associated with the cloud.
Jisc is preparing a series of reports into academic use of cloud computing.
Gaynor Backhouse, director of TechWatch, said the sector uses huge energy-hungry data sets, and needs to share services and find ways of generating its own power.
"Universities and colleges must do far more than a few quick hits afforded by small behavioural changes and interim technology developments," she said. "They must start to work together across the sector to implement much bigger plans for a sustainable future, and the report provides some guidance as to how this might be done."
Talkback
By putting Cloud Computing in areas with natural cooling and power generation and using industrial-sized purchasing power and control, Cloud vendors can be many times more green than on premise computing solutions. Flexible power components that are purpose built for cloud racks are much cheaper and run far more efficiently than anything on premise.
In addition, the cost and power consumption of networking is dropping all the time, it cannot possibly outweigh the benefits of a data centre running in Iceland next to hydro-electric power.
Do these people actually know what they are talking about? Where in the report does it actually go into cost analysis. It's not obvious from the link you posted.
I am Tushar Khera, MBA student from the University of Leicester, UK. I am doing my dissertation on "Cloud computing: Its effects on organisation's strategies".
I plan to use qualitative research method which will include interviews, to gather information on my research topic.I wished to interview members to get information on this research topic. Could I interview you to get information on this topic.
Awaiting a positive reply.
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Thanks and Regards
--Tushar Khera
email id: tkhera_15@yahoo.com