the role of it management software in the greening of it

WHITE PAPER: THE GREENING OF IT

The Role of IT ManagementSoftware in the Greeningof ITJANUARY 2009

Benjamin ScheererSOLUTIONS MARKETING

Sam SomashekarSOLUTIONS PRODUCT MANAGEMENT

Table of Contents

Executive Summary

SECTION 1: 2The Increasing Demand for Energy

IT’s Role in Energy Usage, Cost andEnvironmental Impact

IT Must Reduce Its Carbon Footprint

SECTION 2: 3IT Management and Asset/ProcessOptimization

Green IT and IT Management Software

SECTION 3: 6IT Management Software Enables GreenIT Goals

Key Green IT Software Capabilities

SECTION 4: CONCLUSIONS 9

SECTION 5: REFERENCES 9

SECTION 6: ABOUT THE AUTHOR 10

Copyright © 2009 CA. All rights reserved. All trademarks, trade names, service marks and logos referenced herein belong to their respective companies. This document is for your informational purposes only. To the extent permittedby applicable law, CA provides this document “As Is” without warranty of any kind, including, without limitation, any implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose, or noninfringement. In no event will CA beliable for any loss or damage, direct or indirect, from the use of this document, including, without limitation, lost profits, business interruption, goodwill or lost data, even if CA is expressly advised of such damages.

WHITE PAPER: THE GREENING OF IT 1

Executive SummaryChallenge

The demands on information technology continue to rise at an increasing rate. To keep upwith the demand, IT departments are increasing the use of computing and associatedresources. The demand on energy is also reaching epic proportions, and power grids areshowing signs that they are struggling to meet demand through higher consumer energycosts and power usage caps for corporations. As a major consumer of power, IT departmentsare being challenged to find innovative ways to reduce power consumption and reduce thecompany’s overall carbon footprint. IT is now facing overall economic and socioeconomicpressures to reduce costs and go green.

Opportunity

As companies build and implement strategies for increased efficiencies in IT-related assetutilization and process orchestration, they can also begin to realize significant opportunities.These include cost savings and the reduced environmental impact from excessive powerconsumption. Well-executed strategies aligned with the proper IT management softwaresolutions allow these companies to swiftly execute and accurately identify its benefits.Going green in IT does not necessarily require a substantial investment in new technology.Enterprise IT management software can leverage legacy and new technology investmentsto achieve greater efficiencies faster and at lower costs, while accurately measuring ITsavings and impact on the environment.

Benefits

Many IT departments already have the tools for IT management in place. Leveraging thoseinvestments to implement more efficient computing practices benefits the business in twodistinct ways: cost savings and support for Green IT initiatives. This includes support forpending environmental or green regulations and support for internal objectives (such asreducing energy usage and associated costs and driving better utilization of existingassets). The net result of implementing software solutions for Green IT is overall costsavings, reduced environmental impact and good corporate citizenship.

2 WHITE PAPER: THE GREENING OF IT

SECTION 1

The Increasing Demand for EnergyIT’s Role in Energy Usage, Cost and Environmental ImpactToday’s fragile economy presents many challenges to corporate IT departments to cutcosts, reduce risk and increase efficiency. Energy costs are on the rise and the demand forIT-supported services continues to grow. As a result, many IT departments have taken a stepback to reassess their delivery and support of IT-related services to the business.

Along with the economic impact, there is also a socioeconomic challenge for businessesworldwide to embrace sustainability practices with an emphasis on IT, particularly in the areaof data center operations. According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), energyconsumption from servers and data centers has doubled in the past five years and will continueto double again in the next 5 years.

Green IT, by most accounts, is not a frontline initiative by corporate IT departments, but rathera positive side effect of what IT departments are already being tasked to do given currenteconomic conditions. In fact, the slowdown in the economy and overall IT spending presentsideal conditions for moving towards more efficient use of technologies, which supportscorporate Green IT initiatives.

According to a recent study by Echo Research, Inc., IT plays a major role in corporate greeninitiatives, primarily when addressing energy consumption within the data center. Many newand improved hardware technologies have been introduced to address data center powerinefficiencies. These include newer energy efficient server and networking hardware, advancedpower-distribution units (PDUs), and intelligent HVAC equipment.

Software technologies also further the Green IT movement by making IT more efficient throughbetter use of new hardware technologies and existing investments. For example, virtualizationmanagement software enables Green IT initiatives through server consolidation onto moreefficient platforms, which reduces power, space and cooling requirements. In this way, softwaretechnology allows for that efficiency to become part of normal service flows.

Current economic conditions are forcing IT departments to become more creative whenimplementing strategies that increase IT efficiency. Software technology has been recognizedas a more cost-effective option, as opposed to solely adopting newer hardware solutions thatcan prove more costly and more likely to present additional risk. Green IT must represent manyfacets of an IT management strategy to both enable and demonstrate consequential value.

IT Must Reduce Its Carbon FootprintThere is a dramatic energy side-effect of the ever-increasing demand for informationtechnology that must be dealt with now. EPA findings report that data centers consumed about60 billion kilowatt-hours (kWh) in 2006, roughly 1.5 percent of total U.S. electricity consumption.That’s enough power to run over 24 million 42-inch plasma televisions for 3 years! The reportalso states that this number could nearly double again by 2011 to more than 100 billion kWh.


The increased demand for power by IT is placing additional stress upon the already overloadedpower grids that support them, and that means less power given to those organizations thatare in need. Also not to be forgotten is the further proliferation of harmful greenhouse gasemissions from fossil fuel power plants. IT is in a good position to do its part in controlling andreducing its growing need for energy. This includes protecting itself against potential roadblocksthat may place physical limits on the amounts of power provided by the traditional grids. Inaddition, pending regulations such as the Kyoto Protocol and carbon trading programs willforce IT to realize the issue and better manage their total carbon emissions. IT leaders mustmandate identifiable and measurable green standards through existing and new project plans.This will validate and support an organization’s overall green efforts and goals. In turn, IT willhelp prepare the business for a sustainable future.

SECTION 2

IT Management and Asset/Process Optimization

GREEN IT MANAGEMENT

In the early stages of distributed computing, the focus on cost savings was primarily centeredaround hardware, with a much lower emphasis on the total cost of ownership across the entirelifecycle. This era produced a wave of over-provisioning of server and desktop hardware thatresulted in vast complexities and inefficiencies, which significantly drove up overall costs. Today’strends in IT management show undeniable proof of the benefits from server consolidation andoptimization through the use of virtualized and automated environments, which include greaterefficiency in overall server utilization. Furthermore, IT leadership is being tasked, and challengingtheir teams, to find innovative ways to stretch their budgets through increased efficiency.

FIGURE A

IT management maturity levels forenabling efficiency.


Asset and process optimization is paramount to progressing data center efficiency, which inturn supports Green IT initiatives. But, many risks have come to light as a result of preparingthe IT environment for becoming more efficient. To optimize IT assets through virtualizationand consolidation, organizations must gain a thorough understanding of the current state ofutilization and associated dependencies. This, in short, involves leveraging IT managementtools to gather and report asset catalogs (through asset discovery) on both software and itssupporting hardware infrastructure. Additionally, application dependencies must be accuratelyand dynamically mapped so that the impact of consolidation is both recognized and anticipated.Next, companies must apply change and configuration management approaches with the samerigor as their traditional physical infrastructure.

Change must be carefully managed to ensure a smooth transition to virtualized machines, andcheckpoints must be determined in the event that change needs to be reverted. If unapprovedchanges happen to occur, mechanisms need to be in place to automatically detect them andnotify the appropriate management personnel based on a triggered instance. This allowscompanies to control potential risk and manage impact, such as what a change couldpotentially do to their energy and cooling footprint. Finally, implementing a thorough ITmanagement strategy that utilizes new and existing investments is necessary to ensureoptimal performance and delivery of IT services to the business. An optimal IT managementstrategy must provide extensive visibility across platforms and underlying infrastructure, bothphysical and virtual.

Green IT and IT Management Software Hardware manufacturers continue to drive towards greater efficiency around power consumptionand total heat output (which lowers cooling costs), and increased capacity within their server,network and device technologies. These advancements allow IT management software to playan even greater role in taking advantage of those achievements to increase IT efficiency andmoreover measure progress against stated goals. However, IT management software can alsomake better use of existing equipment and reduce the need for purchasing new hardware.

According to the EPA study, “…existing technologies and design strategies have been shownto reduce the energy use of a typical server by 25 percent or more. Even with existing ITequipment, implementing best energy-management practices in existing data centers andconsolidating applications from many servers to one server could reduce current data centerenergy usage by around 20 percent.” Streamlining IT performance does not have to meanincreasing energy consumption.

According to Echo Research, companies are budgeting for changes to their IT infrastructure tomanage energy consumption, with virtualization and consolidation leading the way. The EchoResearch findings also confirm that software solutions are very important to energy efficiencyfor 80 percent of the U.S. respondents and 72 percent of the U.K. respondents. The emphasison software to manage change and enable efficiency paves the way for more innovativethinking in the application of efficient practices throughout IT management software.


ECHO RESEARCH FINDINGS ON SOFTWARE BUDGETING

Two examples of how management software can help support Green IT initiatives areas follows:

First, consider the holiday shopping season. Many online businesses count on the periodthat begins on Black Friday and continues through Cyber Monday and the end of the year. It isimportant for them to handle the increase in load effectively so that they can be profitable. Inthe past, servers were provisioned to meet the high watermark of requirements, but they alsoremained up and running for the entire fiscal year. This draws on energy requirements withoutthe necessary increases in capacity usage and business support for those resources.

IT management software today allows those very same resources to be brought online in ascheduled manner. They are provisioned to the specific application requirements needed tosupport the influx of demand for this period of time. These resources can either be physical orvirtual. When the need has been satisfied, those resources can then be shut down and placedoffline for future use. What’s more, for unplanned events, these very resources can also bebrought online dynamically when predetermined consumption thresholds have been exceeded.Then, they can be shut down when the low utilization point is reached. This allows IT tointelligently respond to user demand in near real-time, and significantly reduce powerconsumption during non-peak periods.

Effectively leveraging a pool of resources that can be dynamically provisioned to meet thespecific needs of a particular functional group (such as order processing) saves energy. It canlimit the number of physical machines that an organization needs to have up and running.From a virtualization context, this also aids in properly throttling capacity for those physicalmachines to match dynamic business needs. Pooling resources also enables companies tobalance support for multiple functional groups and services, faster and with less physicalinfrastructure.

FIGURE B

What changes to IT infrastructure haveorganizations budgeted for? VIRTUALIZATION/CONSOLIDATING SERVERS

VIRTUALIZATION & CONSOLIDATING STORAGE

IMPROVE EFFICIENCY OF EXISTING ASSETS

CONSOLIDATING DATA CENTERS

IT PROCESSES & METRICS

SOFTWARE APPLICATION CHANGE MANAGEMENT

IMPLEMENT PC & SERVER POWER MANAGEMENT

US

UK

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70%


The second example involves client hardware such as laptops, desktops, and PDAs. With thelow acquisition cost of PCs and laptops today, PC sprawl is a very real concern. The increase inthe number of desktops dramatically increases the power load for an organization without thenecessary business productivity gains. IT management software can dynamically discover andcategorize client hardware to give companies a complete view of how these machines arebeing used throughout their business environment. Power-related configurations can then beenforced to save on overall energy costs and consumption. For those machines that do notseem to be supporting the business in any particular way, appropriate action can be taken topull them offline and dispose of them according to proper guidelines. Perhaps some of thosemachines require upgrades based upon the applications that they need to run.

With certain IT management software, organizations can specifically determine the clientmachines that require upgrades to control costs and hardware waste. Furthermore, clientmachines that are not really being used can effectively be repurposed based upon the roleswithin the organization. This involves determining if those client machines are not being usedto their fullest capacity. All of this goes towards maximizing the use of existing hardware andavoiding new hardware purchases when possible to support employee productivity, costsavings and energy impact as it relates to the business.

These examples show how IT management software improves efficient management ofresources to reduce the effect that IT has on the environment.

SECTION 3

IT Management Software Enables Green IT GoalsKey Green IT Software CapabilitiesWhen looking at software to support Green IT initiatives, there are three key goals thatcompanies will want to achieve. These goals will have associated software capabilities thatcan enable fulfillment (as is shown in Figure C and described below).

INCREASE EFFICIENCY Enabling Green IT initiatives are synonymous with implementing moreefficient processes and practices within IT. Therefore, it is important to harness the benefitsthat IT management software provides:

• Physical and Virtual Systems Management solutions allow for the identification ofunderutilized equipment and the correlation of power and cooling consumption with theservers that use them.

• Data Center and Workload Automation solutions enable unified management and dynamicoptimization of physical and virtual server resources. Those resources can be enabled whenrequired and, more importantly, shut down when not needed. These solutions also increasemanagement capability for virtualization to ensure physical machine capacity is properlycontrolled. They also allow for optimized workload placement and execution, takingadvantage of peak and off-peak energy usage times and minimizing resource consumption.

• IT Client Management solutions drive standardization of desktop power managementsettings to optimize energy efficiency. They correlate hardware upgrades with specificemployee and business needs to reduce waste and increase optimization of existinghardware.


• IT Asset Management solutions keep track of IT assets and their relation to the applicationsthat they run to optimize equipment upgrades and identify those assets which are notproviding a business purpose. Those that are not needed can be properly disposed of toensure compliance with internal standards and government regulations.

REDUCE RISK IT management software can help companies identify and mitigate environmentalrisk. This includes compliance to environmental regulations such as the Kyoto Protocol andcap-and-trade programs. The Kyoto Protocol is a protocol to the United Nations FrameworkConvention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which is an international environmental treaty. Thetreaty’s intent is to achieve "stabilization of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphereat a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system."Emissions trading (sometimes called cap-and-trade) provide economic incentives for achievingreductions in pollutant emissions. IT management software capabilities to support this goal include:

• Change, Configuration and Release Management solutions track and implement generalchange management, configurations and settings to minimize energy consumption andreduce environmental risk.

• Service Level and Catalog Management solutions allow organizations to clearly define, priceand publish a catalog of services to users. They can be used to automate and tracksustainable behavior and distribute energy costs across the many departments involvedwithin composite services. For example, a building pass service can grant hybrid car ownersparking passes closer to the building.

• Green Governance solutions allow companies to use a systematic approach to environmentalsustainability. These solutions incorporate a continuous improvement lifecycle andencompass business areas such as:– strategy– risk management– compliance management– idea management– portfolio management– project management– performance management– stakeholder reporting

MEASURE SUCCESS It is very important for organizations to understand where they are byestablishing a baseline before deciding upon and enacting change, and to continually measuresuccess towards their Green IT goals. Without measurement, it would be difficult to understandany progress towards achievement of these goals, let alone be able to surmise the benefits thatGreen IT software solutions provide. IT management software is ideal for this purpose:

• Operations Energy Management solutions allow companies to harness the abundance ofpower and cooling information available from a variety of simple to complex monitoringdevices deployed throughout their IT infrastructure. That data can then be accuratelyprovided to the many other IT management solutions for reporting and decision-makingprowess. These solutions also enable facilities and IT to work better together, using thesame information.


The Green Grid is a global consortium dedicated to advancing energy efficiency in datacenters and business computing ecosystems. This association suggests that internalcollaboration between IT and Facilities promotes propagation of planned and measurabledata center efficiency. As stated in a white paper published by The Green Grid, “…not havingstrategic representation by Facilities will result in data centers not being properly provisionedand exhaustion of existing energy capacity early in the useful life of the data center.”

• Project and Portfolio Management solutions allow for the organization and management ofsustainability projects as a portfolio, and the incorporation of environmental variables intoexisting projects. This allows organizations to gain insight into how their portfolio of projectsaffects the environment and to track performance of those projects.

• Green Governance solutions, in addition to helping reduce risk, also allow for themeasurement and visualization of progress towards stated sustainability goals.

ESSENTIAL GREEN IT SOFTWARE CAPABILITIES

These essential IT management software capabilities contribute to efficient management,directly furthering Green IT goals. From increasing hardware utilization to decreasing equipmentfootprint and cooling costs, these IT management areas can be effectively managed with lowrisk by employing the proper management techniques.

New and improved infrastructure alternatives such as Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) and CloudComputing provide further innovation in efficient resource utilization. SaaS solutions allow theuser to avoid the cost of infrastructure setup by renting the software on-demand for use as aservice. Cloud Computing involves the use of computing resources as a service over the internet,relinquishing control of the infrastructure to the provider. On-demand use of pooled resourcesincreases efficiency through just-in-time utilization, providing computing resources as neededwithout the necessary burden of changing local IT infrastructure. Use of SaaS solutions andCloud Computing resources promote efficient management of IT infrastructure, which in turnreduces environmental effects.

FIGURE C

IT management software capabilitiesaligned with Green IT goals.


SECTION 4

ConclusionsGoing green represents a company’s mission to support environmental sustainability. Whetherit’s socially inspired or economically driven — it simply makes good business sense.

In most cases the initial driver of a Green IT strategy is the cost savings that can be attainedthrough increased efficiencies in energy usage. Achieving sustainability benefits represents asecondary, albeit positive by-product. While advancements in energy efficient IT hardware promotethis cause along with services to implement best practices, IT management software representsa powerful yet cost-effective solution to implement unified and consistent Green IT goals.

IT management software enables comprehensive management, monitoring, and optimizedutilization of new and existing hardware investments. This includes the most effective use ofenergy-efficient hardware while extending the life of existing hardware.

Finally, to demonstrate a company’s commitment to the environment and its progress towardsachieving stated goals, a system to measure progress must be in place. Whether from thebusiness perspective or support for environmental sustainability, Green IT must be managedlike any other project to realize its full potential. IT management software lets companiesexecute on all of these mandates. It allows Green IT goals to be incorporated within existingbusiness processes and practices to prevent silo efforts around increasing general IT efficiency,and helps to reduce integration complexity in the future. Additionally, in the process, companiesbecome better corporate citizens and help save the planet for tomorrow’s generations.

SECTION 5

References"Article 2", The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.http://unfccc.int/essential_background/convention/background/items/1353.php(accessed February 11, 2009).

Echo Research, Inc., The Future of Green IT: Implications for Software Solutions, November 17, 2008.http://www.ca.com/us/products/collateral.aspx?cid=188114 (accessed December 11, 2008).

The Green Grid, Addressing Organizational Behavior Issues to Optimize IT and Facilities EnergyEfficiency, July 30, 2008. http://www.thegreengrid.org/gg_content/White_Paper_9_-_Addressing_Organizational_Behavior_Issues_073008_v1.0_.pdf (accessed January 20, 2009).

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Report to Congress on Server Data Center Energy EfficiencyPublic Law 109-431, August 2, 2007.http://www.energystar.gov/ia/partners/prod_development/downloads/EPA_Datacenter_Report_Congress_Final1.pdf (accessed December 10, 2008).


SECTION 6

About the AuthorsBen Scheerer is senior principal product marketing manager for CA, Inc. With more than 16years of industry experience, which has run the course of sales to pre-sales, consulting andproduct marketing, Ben’s experience with enterprise IT management has helped businessesbetter align their goals for improving service while reducing costs. Ben’s contributions outsideof CA include numerous speaking engagements, published articles and white papers on ITmanagement related topics. Ben holds a BBA in Marketing from Western Michigan Universityand a Masters degree in Computer Information Systems from the University of Denver, and isITIL V3 foundation certified.

Sam Somashekar is an advisor of product management at CA, Inc. Sam has over 15 years ofexperience demonstrating success in enterprise software product management and development,business development, marketing, and market research. He has experience establishing,developing, and inspiring high-performance teams, providing product vision, and delivering thebest value to customers. Sam’s current responsibilities include defining CA’s Enterprise ITManagement strategy and vision around Data Center Automation and Green IT initiatives. Samholds a BA in Computer Science and Biology from New York University, and is PMC certified inProduct Management. He is also on the board of AFCOM’s Data Center Institute, and hasseveral published articles and white papers on the subject of enterprise IT management.

CA (NASDAQ: CA), one of the world’s leading independent,enterprise management software companies, unifies andsimplifies complex information technology (IT) managementacross the enterprise for greater business results. With ourEnterprise IT Management vision, solutions and expertise,we help customers effectively govern, manage and secure IT.

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