Green IT is revolutionizing UK cyber-Infrastructure via networks, cloud, outsouring and financial incentives

[As readers of this blog may know I have long argued that advances in research and education through cyber-infrastructure (or eInfrastructure) can be largely justified, if not entirely paid for through the energy savings of using clouds, networks or outsourcing.
But a big impediment in adopting cyber-infrastructure in most jurisdictions is the lack of financial incentives. The energy savings of cyber-infrastructure are usually earned by the facilities or estates department or rarely based on to researchers and educators. But initiatives like national Green Revolving Funds, funded by the national government such as the 10 million Salix pound program in the UK, and JISC/JANET programs to promote clouds, outsourcing and Green IT are starting to make a difference. More importantly universities such as Cambridge are developing programs to pass on energy savings to individual departments. Another great example is the public-private partnership of London University and UNIT4 to offer shared outsourcing services to UK universities, as well as the recent JANET cloud brokering offering. If these collocated facilities use green or renewable power, the carbon/energy savings for a university can be significantly greater than more traditional energy saving schemes such as changing light bulbs or adding insulation. Of course, advanced high speed R&E networks supporting Software Defined Networks and Hybrid optical backbones are critical for this vision. Ultimately I think such initiatives can entirely underwrite the cost of such advanced networks by making Green Revolving Funds aware of the huge energy savings available by integrating advanced networks with clouds and outsourcing. Kudos to JISC/JANET for these forward thinking services -- BSA]

Cambridge Shared Savings
http://www.goodcampus.org/susteit/susteit-cases/index.php
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A new case study from the JISC-funded RECSO Project, managed by Forum for the Future with inputs from SusteIT, describes the background, aims and working of the Electricity Incentive Scheme (EIS) that Cambridge University implemented in 2008/09 and has since developed. The Scheme encourages consumers of electricity across the University to maximise their energy efficiency through a system of financial incentives (both rewards and penalties) at a departmental level. It thus achieves the benefits of fully devolved energy budgets without the administrative and managerial implications that this could have involved. The Scheme saved an estimated £820,000 in energy costs in its first year. Although not targeted at ICT, it obviously provides general incentives to tackle its energy use - as evidenced by an Appendix which details how the scheme helped stimulate an innovative green data centre (PUE approaching 1.1) in the Department of Engineering (also featured in the presentations from our September 2011 workshop at Cambridge).
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University of London Computer Centre and UNIT4 join forces to deliver shared services to educational institutions
Further and Higher Education Institutions to benefit from Agresso Campus Platform as a Shared Service.
UNIT4 and the University of London Computer Centre (ULCC), the University of London’s provider of shared IT services, today announced they have signed a Memorandum of Understanding to deliver shared services based on the Agresso Campus Platform to educational institutions across the UK. This is the first such agreement between an educational establishment and a vendor to jointly provide enterprise software as a shared service.
ULCC will provide hosting and support services to institutions, that will benefit from reduced IT infrastructure costs while capitalising on the economies of scale that come from sharing. With ULCC being a point-of-presence for JANET(UK), the UK’s Higher Education’s network, customers can also rest assured that the service will be fast and reliable.
“Integrated back-office solutions will become indispensable as institutions look to address sector challenges,” said Richard Maccabee, Director of ICT at the University of London. “We chose the Agresso Campus Platform because it provides sector specific solutions across the board for both Further and Higher Education. What’s more, Agresso’s architecture is unique and allows us to easily adapt the solution to meet the individual requirements of customers. This improves our competitive advantage and will keep our development costs low. In fact we have already implemented or agreed service contracts with four institutions in just 12 months.”
The Agresso Campus Platform offers educational institutions a portfolio of tightly integrated solutions covering all functional areas including financial management, student management, research award management, CRM, curriculum management and reporting and analytics. These best-of-class technologies provide agile, interoperable solutions to help Institutions adapt to increasing complexity, business change and funding challenges including the impacts of growing student numbers, new revenue streams and organisational and regulatory changes.
“Shared services delivers huge shared efficiencies allowing institutions to focus their resources on what they do best, education and research,” said Anwen Robinson, Managing Director of UNIT4 Business Software Ltd. “ULCC is an example of best practice in a sector that is desperate to cut costs and modernise. They are also a trusted advisor to the sector and the faith they have demonstrated in UNIT4 sends a clear message to the market.”



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R&E Network and Green Internet Consultant.
email: Bill.St.Arnaud@gmail.com
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