information technology

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The envisioned, next-generation smart grid is an evolution that builds on decades of accumulated engineering lessons learned to make the ways that we deliver and receive electricity more intelligent, robust and reliable. But utilities, industry, policymakers and even consumers must not underestimate what is being undertaken here. The...[read more]

Did you make a New Year’s resolution to clean up your email, update your Facebook or LinkedIn sites, or organize your desk?  I’m pleased to say that I’ve already crossed one resolution off my list and reduced my email inbox contents by 50%.  The greater challenge will be to maintain this orderly inbox state.   We live...[read more]

Throughout all of the talks about Smart Grid systems - the buzzword for the concept of a power grid that can both send electricity and communicate two ways instead of one - there is one piece that most fascinates me: What is going to be done with the enormous amount of data that is collected on a system using this grid? The implications...[read more]

Scientific American has an article on the start-up pains associated with smart grid development: Only one thing is worse than the lights not coming on when the switch is flicked—and that’s the lights going out right afterward. The fact that the problem is most often a burned-out lightbulb is testimony to the reliability of what’s...[read more]

It’s nice to see Ontario’s information and privacy commissioner, Ann Cavoukian, being so proactive on the issue of privacy as it relates to deployment of the smart grid. (Disclosure: Cavoukian is a good friend of mine and co-author of a book we wrote on privacy issues back in 2002). Cavoukian’s latest annual report highlights the...[read more]

Todd Woody has an article at Yale Environment 360 on the technology industry's interest in clean energy, noting "companies such as Google, Adobe Systems, and eBay are preparing for the next step — investing in off-site solar and wind installations and innovative technologies that will supply their offices and data centers with green...[read more]

Photo credit tipiro Cloud computing may not be as Green as you think. I mentioned previously that I gave a keynote presentation at the Green IT Summit in Dublin last week. In the question and answers session after the talk, Sean Baker asked about cloud computing and whether I thought companies using cloud computing weren’t simply...[read more]

Photo: IBM In a story in The New York Times on Wednesday, I write about IBM's new initiative to green up its $40 billion global supply chain: I.B.M. said on Wednesday that it will require its 28,000 suppliers in more than 90 countries to install management systems to gather data on their energy use, greenhouse gas emissions and waste...[read more]

We have pointed to the ongoing convergence of wireless communications and smart grids before, for example in this video about Tropos Networks and in Tom’s stump pitch on sustainability and mobility, but some news from this week throws the trend into stark relief. Carbon Trust investments, the VC arm of a non-profit organisation...[read more]

Much conversation around the greening of information technology is, frankly, boring. Energy-efficient data centers, PCs that sleep automatically, cloud computing that uses server capacity more efficiently–all important, to be sure, but dull. What’s more intriguing are the ways IT is being used to attack big environmental problems. IBM...[read more]

I got my start in mainstream journalism as a technology and telecommunications reporter for the Globe and Mail, a beat I later took on at the Toronto Star and covered for six years before switching to energy. When I first started we were still using the term “information highway” to describe the coming convergence between the telephone...[read more]

Photo credit James Jordan I wrote about SAP’s launch of their Sustainability Performance Management software recently. This is a space which is of massively growing importance given the increasing regulations around greenhouse gas emissions, for example. I was heartened then to hear in a recent discussion with SAS that their...[read more]

Photo credit IronRodArt I saw a report on the Green Data Center Blog today that a new industry group called GreenTouch has been formed with the express aim of reducing the amount of energy communications networks (including the Internet) use. In fact their Global Mission is to, by 2015: deliver the architecture, specifications...[read more]

In the last year or so the rationale for renewable energy has evolved from emphasizing mainly energy security and climate change to focusing on the creation of "green jobs" and the development of an industry that many perceive as the "next big thing": a new global growth wave along the lines of information technology and telecoms....[read more]

Technology can’t get more visible and disruptive than Home Energy Management Systems (HEMS). HEMS solutions are one of the most critical components of the Smart Grid – truly game-changing solutions that change the relationship residential consumers have with electricity and with utilities.HEMS solutions are software solutions that offer...[read more]