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CASE STUDY: UNIVERSITY OF ABERDEEN DATA CENTRE
The University of Aberdeen has won numerous prizes for its cutting-edge data centre, including a Green Gown Award University data centre, which had been around since the 1990s, was turned into a state-of-the-art shared service for all the higher education organisations in the allowing institutions to vacate current also saved them on energy bills by using Before the refurbishment, the data centre
now down to 75 kilowatts, which translates to a massive cost saving of £80,000– by about 500 tonnes a year, the equivalent
Partnering with Aberdeen were Robert Gordon University and the North East vice-principal of student services at the within the Scottish education sector for some time towards working more for a solution at the same time and it The service not only got people
together, but went from a power usage
The drivers for green “Universities’ desire to go green is very signifi cant,” says Andy Bennet , group sales and commercial director for the Stone Group, with whom universities currently spend around £80m a year on ICT. “Green is at ractive to students and it is part of their corporate social responsibility. Universities are behaving more and more like the big corporations we work with across the rest of the public sector.” Not only do students expect their
institution to have a level of commitment to green agenda, they also want to learn about it. The National Union of Students have published research showing that over 80% of undergraduates believe that skills for sustainability should be covered by their university experience.
The cost factor But while ethics and students come high on the list, the real motivation for universities’ carbon reduction may well be fi nancial. As Andy Bennet explains: “It’s a constant balance between green sustainable IT, ethical sourcing and cost. There are few procurement bodies that can justify paying signifi cant premiums to support green IT.” Universities save money on printing by going digital or by mandating duplex or reduced printing. They reduce travel costs when they support video conferencing. They bring down energy bills through intelligent building design – for example using
smart LED lights, automated power systems and computers that go to sleep automatically.
Winning hearts and minds “There’s only so much that preaching can do,” says Rob Bristow, green expert at Jisc, the UK’s technology charity for universities and colleges. “It’s much bet er to set systems up so people are incentivised to do the right thing.” Indeed, more and more UK universities are taking a holistic approach to greening their organisation – not just thinking of it as a problem for the Estates or IT department. In the last year, a number of universities including Leeds, Southampton and Edinburgh have created a sustainability team to raise the profi le of their commitment to not just environmental but also social and ethical concerns.
Hot stuff Aside from the challenge of changing peoples’ at itudes towards energy use, the other great issue facing universities is the cooling of their ICT equipment. It is estimated that the HE sector spends £147m a year on energy to support its ICT alone – including the costs of providing and operating the associated cooling and power supply infrastructure. There are individual bits of tech that are helping. Low-power replacements for desktop PCs are highly effi cient, such as Intel’s ‘next
Main image (above): Bigstock Images. Aberdeen and Leeds imagery used courtesy of the universities
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