Cybera to Host Solar-Powered Node in Canada's First "Green" Internet
http://cybera.ca/cybera-host-solar-powered-node-canadas-first-green-internet
(January 25, 2010 – Calgary, AB) – Cybera, a non-profit organization accelerating Alberta's competitive advantage research and development, will host the Calgary node for Canada’s first “green” powered internet network. The GreenStar Network Project, an alliance of Canada's leading IT companies, universities and international partners, has been funded by CANARIE, Canada’s research and innovation network, to develop an internet network where the nodes will be powered entirely by wind and solar energy.
GreenStar nodes are small datacentres-in-a-box which are solar-powered and connected to the research network infrastructure with optical fibre. Cybera will install, configure and maintain a solar-powered node in Calgary as part of the GreenStar Network. Cybera is investigating host locations in the University of Calgary’s Research Park.
"This ties in perfectly with Cybera's mandate to support and drive the development of innovative cyberinfrastructure," said Robin Winsor, Cybera President and CEO. "At the same time, it lets us contribute to the goal of building sustainable, energy-smart infrastructure."
GeoChronos, a Cybera project enabling Earth Observation Science researchers to share scientific data and applications via a web portal, will be one of the GreenStar Network’s first users. In 2008, GeoChronos received approximately $900,000 from CANARIE in the first round of its Network-Enabled Platforms program. CANARIE continues to be a supporter of GeoChronos. The Grid Research Centre at the University of Calgary, a Cybera partner, will contribute to the GreenStar Network’s research into carbon-based management of virtual machine mobility. The network’s rollout, led by the Université du Quebec's École de technologie supérieure (ETS) in Montreal, began this month.
"We are incredibly proud to launch the GreenStar Network under the leadership of CANARIE’s Green IT Pilot program,” said Dr. Mohamed Cheriet, Director of Synchromedia at ÉTS and spokesperson for the GreenStar Network. “The GreenStar Network has come together to develop low-carbon technologies, including renewable energy like wind and solar-powered networks, virtualization, carbon quantification procedures, and tools to ensure ICT’s carbon footprint remains under control and doesn’t increase as the world becomes more and more reliant on information and communications technologies."
CANARIE’s Green IT Pilot program has allocated $2.4 million in funding for four ground-breaking Green IT projects aimed at reducing ICT’s carbon footprint and measuring the impact of ICT and cyberinfrastructure on university electrical consumption. The Greenstar Network was the program’s largest funding recipient, receiving $2 million to develop its data network.
"CANARIE has always been a global leader in high-speed networks that enable research and innovation. Now, these Green IT initiatives demonstrate how CANARIE is once again trailblazing the next evolution of networks that are committed to both high performance and the environment," said CANARIE President Guy Bujold.
Participants in the GreenStar Network Project include the Canadian Standards Association, Climate Change Services; the Grid Research Centre, University of Calgary; RackForce Networks Inc.; Prompt Inc.; BastionHost Inc.; Cybera Inc.; Université du Québec a Montréal; ideal Consulting Inc.; Communications Research Centre; and Inocybe Technologies Inc.
email: Bill.St.Arnaud@gmail.com
twitter: BillStArnaud
blog: http://billstarnaud.blogspot.com/
skype: Pocketpro
This blog is about using ICTs to develop climate change preparedness solutions built around Energy Internet and autonomous eVehicles
Energy Internet and eVehicles Overview
Governments around the world are wrestling with the challenge of how to prepare society for inevitable climate change. To date most people have been focused on how to reduce Green House Gas emissions, but now there is growing recognition that regardless of what we do to mitigate against climate change the planet is going to be significantly warmer in the coming years with all the attendant problems of more frequent droughts, flooding, sever storms, etc. As such we need to invest in solutions that provide a more robust and resilient infrastructure to withstand this environmental onslaught especially for our electrical and telecommunications systems and at the same time reduce our carbon footprint.
Using autonomous eVehicles for Renewable Energy Transportation and Distribution: http://goo.gl/bXO6x and http://goo.gl/UDz37
Free High Speed Internet to the Home or School Integrated with solar roof top: http://goo.gl/wGjVG
High level architecture of Internet Networks to survive Climate Change: https://goo.gl/24SiUP
Architecture and routing protocols for Energy Internet: http://goo.gl/niWy1g
How to use Green Bond Funds to underwrite costs of new network and energy infrastructure: https://goo.gl/74Bptd
Monday, January 25, 2010
IEEE to develop standards for CO2 offsets from Hydro and Wind Power Projects
[This is important news for organizations who are looking to relocate their computers and servers to data centers powered by renewable energy sources. Having a standard set of criteria for offsets from hydro and wind power facilities will go a long way in being able to earn CO2 offsets to pay to move the computer equipment to these facilities. Thanks to Tom Bauman of ClimateCheck for this pointer -- BSA]
IEEE Begins Work on Standard for Quantifying Greenhouse Gas Emission Credits from Hydro and Wind Power Projects
http://standards.ieee.org/announcements/ieeeP1595_greenhouse.html
Contact:
Karen McCabe, IEEE-SA Marketing Director
+1 732-562-3824, k.mccabe@ieee.org
PISCATAWAY, N.J., USA, 2 September 2009 -- The IEEE has begun work on a standard which will help hydro- and wind-power projects calculate greenhouse gas (GHG) emission credits.
The standard, IEEE P1595(TM), "Standard for Quantifying Greenhouse Gas Emission Credits from Small Hydro and Wind Power Projects, and for Grid Baseline Conditions," will establish an internationally acceptable basis for measuring, evaluating and quantifying the eligible, real, measurable, verifiable, and unique reduction in CO2 emissions attributable to the specific generation technologies of wind power and small hydro, for use in emissions trading systems.
In addition, the standard will help provide an answer to the generic question, how can one country or jurisdiction to a greenhouse gas emissions trade be assured and satisfied that it is getting real and true value for a purchased GHG emissions credit from another country or jurisdiction.
The standard will use Project Protocols for Wind Power; Small Hydro and Grid Baseline established by Natural Resources Canada as its seed documents.
IEEE P1595 is sponsored by the Energy Development & Power Generation committee of the IEEE Power & Energy Society.
About the IEEE Standards Association
The IEEE Standards Association, a globally recognized standards-setting body, develops consensus standards through an open process that engages industry and brings together a broad stakeholder community. IEEE standards set specifications and best practices based on current scientific and technological knowledge. The IEEE-SA has a portfolio of over 900 active standards and more than 400 standards under development. For information on the IEEE-SA, see: http://standards.ieee.org.
email: Bill.St.Arnaud@gmail.com
twitter: BillStArnaud
blog: http://billstarnaud.blogspot.com/
skype: Pocketpro
IEEE Begins Work on Standard for Quantifying Greenhouse Gas Emission Credits from Hydro and Wind Power Projects
http://standards.ieee.org/announcements/ieeeP1595_greenhouse.html
Contact:
Karen McCabe, IEEE-SA Marketing Director
+1 732-562-3824, k.mccabe@ieee.org
PISCATAWAY, N.J., USA, 2 September 2009 -- The IEEE has begun work on a standard which will help hydro- and wind-power projects calculate greenhouse gas (GHG) emission credits.
The standard, IEEE P1595(TM), "Standard for Quantifying Greenhouse Gas Emission Credits from Small Hydro and Wind Power Projects, and for Grid Baseline Conditions," will establish an internationally acceptable basis for measuring, evaluating and quantifying the eligible, real, measurable, verifiable, and unique reduction in CO2 emissions attributable to the specific generation technologies of wind power and small hydro, for use in emissions trading systems.
In addition, the standard will help provide an answer to the generic question, how can one country or jurisdiction to a greenhouse gas emissions trade be assured and satisfied that it is getting real and true value for a purchased GHG emissions credit from another country or jurisdiction.
The standard will use Project Protocols for Wind Power; Small Hydro and Grid Baseline established by Natural Resources Canada as its seed documents.
IEEE P1595 is sponsored by the Energy Development & Power Generation committee of the IEEE Power & Energy Society.
About the IEEE Standards Association
The IEEE Standards Association, a globally recognized standards-setting body, develops consensus standards through an open process that engages industry and brings together a broad stakeholder community. IEEE standards set specifications and best practices based on current scientific and technological knowledge. The IEEE-SA has a portfolio of over 900 active standards and more than 400 standards under development. For information on the IEEE-SA, see: http://standards.ieee.org.
email: Bill.St.Arnaud@gmail.com
twitter: BillStArnaud
blog: http://billstarnaud.blogspot.com/
skype: Pocketpro
Friday, January 22, 2010
More on how Government CIOs can play leadership role addressing climate change
Increasingly many government agencies around the world are building data centers in distant locations in order to get access to large feeds of affordable power. Vivek Kundra, the Federal CIO points out the federal data centers have doubled their energy use. In a recent talk he stated he is actually anti-data center growth for the traditional model. There are 8 GSA data centers, and 23 homeland security data centers. All built on old models with 100s of millions dollars spent to build data centers the size of city block. There needs to be a new way where there are lower costs and a a greener impact.
The NSA new data centers in Utah and Texas are good examples of this trend as well as NCAR's new data center in Wyoming. Most governments around the world are building new data centers to consolidate servers and address the insatiable demand for more data and storage. Each one of these data centers will consume the power equivalent to the entire municipality of Salt Lake City (about 180,000 souls). In many ways, the data centers are becoming the new industrial heavy users of power, especially as the old manufacturing sector slowly declines and is hollowed out from competition and globalization. Unfortunately most of these new data are using coal based power and now are some of the single biggest new sources of CO2 on the planet.
As the world leaders look to address the challenge of climate change one simple gesture would be a commitment that all new public sector data centers should be built where they can use 100% renewable energy.
Forget about all this silliness with respect to energy efficiency, LEED buildings and low PUE ratios. Locating data centers in jurisdictions with renewable power is the most important step governments can take to reduce their respective carbon footprint. As a minimum government CIOs should not be increasing their nation's carbon footprint by building these facilities in jurisdictions that are entirely dependent on coal fired electricity. For those who are interested I am undertaking a study looking at how government and business CIOs can deploy an internal carbon and energy trading scheme to promote adoption of IT tools to reduce the carbon footprint within their organizations
http://www.slideshare.net/bstarn/government-cio-and-climate-change
Data Center energy use growing while overall industrial use declines
http://www.greenm3.com/2009/11/data-center-energy-use-growing-while-overall-industrial-use-declines.html
NSA's new data center will consume same amount of power as entire Salt Lake City
http://www.greenm3.com/2009/11/vendor-information-for-nsa-utah-data-center.html
Vivek Kundar the Federal CIO speech on government data centers
http://www.greenm3.com/2010/01/cloud-computing-open-source-containers-federal-govt-new-appsgov-model.html
The UK Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC) also indicates a future direction of how the cost of energy will also government computer operations. The CRC is a groundbreaking piece of legislation designed to help the UK meet its carbon reduction targets by 2020. Basically, the CRC scheme will apply to organisations that had a half-hourly metered electricity consumption greater than 6,000 MWh per year in 2008. Organisations qualifying for CRC would have all their energy use covered by the scheme, this includes emissions from direct energy use as well as electricity purchased. Initially, it is estimated, around 5,000 organisations will qualify, including supermarkets, water companies, banks, local authorities and all central Government Departments.
http://www.decc.gov.uk/en/content/cms/what_we_do/lc_uk/crc/crc.aspx
My talk on the important leadership role government CIOs can play in addressing climate change
http://www.slideshare.net/bstarn/government-cio-and-climate-change
e-mail: Bill.st.arnaud@gmail.com
twitter: BillStArnaud
Blog: http://green-broadband.blogspot.com
The NSA new data centers in Utah and Texas are good examples of this trend as well as NCAR's new data center in Wyoming. Most governments around the world are building new data centers to consolidate servers and address the insatiable demand for more data and storage. Each one of these data centers will consume the power equivalent to the entire municipality of Salt Lake City (about 180,000 souls). In many ways, the data centers are becoming the new industrial heavy users of power, especially as the old manufacturing sector slowly declines and is hollowed out from competition and globalization. Unfortunately most of these new data are using coal based power and now are some of the single biggest new sources of CO2 on the planet.
As the world leaders look to address the challenge of climate change one simple gesture would be a commitment that all new public sector data centers should be built where they can use 100% renewable energy.
Forget about all this silliness with respect to energy efficiency, LEED buildings and low PUE ratios. Locating data centers in jurisdictions with renewable power is the most important step governments can take to reduce their respective carbon footprint. As a minimum government CIOs should not be increasing their nation's carbon footprint by building these facilities in jurisdictions that are entirely dependent on coal fired electricity. For those who are interested I am undertaking a study looking at how government and business CIOs can deploy an internal carbon and energy trading scheme to promote adoption of IT tools to reduce the carbon footprint within their organizations
http://www.slideshare.net/bstarn/government-cio-and-climate-change
Data Center energy use growing while overall industrial use declines
http://www.greenm3.com/2009/11/data-center-energy-use-growing-while-overall-industrial-use-declines.html
NSA's new data center will consume same amount of power as entire Salt Lake City
http://www.greenm3.com/2009/11/vendor-information-for-nsa-utah-data-center.html
Vivek Kundar the Federal CIO speech on government data centers
http://www.greenm3.com/2010/01/cloud-computing-open-source-containers-federal-govt-new-appsgov-model.html
The UK Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC) also indicates a future direction of how the cost of energy will also government computer operations. The CRC is a groundbreaking piece of legislation designed to help the UK meet its carbon reduction targets by 2020. Basically, the CRC scheme will apply to organisations that had a half-hourly metered electricity consumption greater than 6,000 MWh per year in 2008. Organisations qualifying for CRC would have all their energy use covered by the scheme, this includes emissions from direct energy use as well as electricity purchased. Initially, it is estimated, around 5,000 organisations will qualify, including supermarkets, water companies, banks, local authorities and all central Government Departments.
http://www.decc.gov.uk/en/content/cms/what_we_do/lc_uk/crc/crc.aspx
My talk on the important leadership role government CIOs can play in addressing climate change
http://www.slideshare.net/bstarn/government-cio-and-climate-change
e-mail: Bill.st.arnaud@gmail.com
twitter: BillStArnaud
Blog: http://green-broadband.blogspot.com
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)