Publications

High Tech: Low Carbon The role of technology in tackling climate change

Section 2: What the technology sector does for other sectors: enhance, enable, transform

A: Enhancing technologies

1E: Nightwatchman and Peterborough City Council
NightWatchman is a computer programme that enables computers that are left on but not in use to be switched of centrally, safely and remotely. Peterborough City Council has 4,500 staff and estimated that 30% of PCs were being left on when not in use, costing the authority between £40 and £60 per machine. Even after an education programme, machines were still being left on because staff found it hard to differentiate between stand-by and off-modes. The Authority recently implemented the NightWatchman software solution, supplied by 1E, across its entire ICT infrastructure. It achieved a return on investment within 3 months, cost savings of £50,000 per annum and a reduction of 250 tonnes of CO2 emissions per annum.

View Nightwatchman and Peterborough City Council case study (pdf 269.1 KB)  more»   

Apsys: SIMLOG and system analysis
With much confusion over which system architecture has the least life cycle cost and lowest carbon emissions, Apsys has developed a new model. Over the last 15 years APSYS has developed and supplied an Integrated Logistic Support (ILS) software tool called SIMLOG. The main functions of SIMLOG are maintenance optimisation and life cycle cost (LCC) assessment. What makes this new module different is that it calculates the carbon emissions of a system and its maintenance and enables users to identify which system architecture and which maintenance options have the lowest carbon footprint and to select the most energy efficient option. Furthermore, it enables the carbon emissions for each option to be costed per tonne, and provides a metric for life cycle cost assessment.

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Dynamic Demand: stabilising energy demand
“Dynamic demand” is an emerging technology that could reduce the amount of electricity used by appliances like fridges and freezers during peak periods through the intervention of small electronic controllers inside the goods. This development could provide a more stable and efficient grid, removing some of the barriers to more renewable electricity generation in the UK which is variable in nature. If fully integrated across the network savings could be in the region of two million tonnes of CO2 emissions a year - the equivalent of taking over 665,000 cars off the road.*

View MTP Dynamic Demand case study (pdf 301.38 KB) more»

View BERR Dynamic Demand case study (pdf 82.85 KB) more»

EDS: holistic infrastructure management
EDS takes a holistic approach to the whole ICT infrastructure. This includes designing the whole architecture with as much centralisation as possible to achieve economies of scale in power consumption, standardising hardware configurations, using low energy devices and optimising power management features, and remote management of PCs so that engineers and IT support staff do not have to travel to different sites to resolve user problems and install upgrades.

Fujitsu: Environmentally Conscious Solutions
Fujitsu Laboratories has developed a method for quantitatively evaluating on a per-environmental-factor basis, the environmental burden reduction effects of adopting particular software or IT service. Utilising this method, Fujitsu is certifying as Environmentally Conscious Solutions those software and IT services offerings that can achieve by their adoption environmental burden reductions of 15% or more (in CO2 equivalent terms) and providing these solutions to their customers By the end of 2005 54 offerings had been certified. Fujitsu also participates in the IT solutions Working group of the Japan Forum on Eco-Efficiency and are involved in creating the ICT Environmental Efficiency Guidelines used to evaluate efforts to reduce environmental burdens through the adoption of IT services.

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IBM: ICT-enabled office optimisation
ICT technologies create opportunities for companies to restructure their office environment so that the use of available office space is optimised, temporarily unused space can be divested and by this the energy consumption per employee and the total energy consumption reduced up to 50%. IBM transformed their office structures at 8 locations in Europe, replacing desktops with notebooks, stationary phones with cordless substitutes, and copy, print and fax facilities with pooled, multifunctional devices. This enables employees to be completely mobile within the building, using an open plan environment which improves flexibility and reduces space and energy requirements. Moreover by combining the office concept with new management concepts, such as working time flexibility, mobile working and home- or tele-working, further demonstrable reductions are possible.

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IBM: road charging
An automatic road charging system implemented in Stockholm by IBM and partners has made a real impact by reducing traffic congestion and energy waste. Congestion was becoming a serious issue in Stockholm, and by 2005 commuting time had increased 18% on the previous year. A congestion charge was introduced in 2006 by the Swedish National Road Administration (SNRA) and the Stockholm City Council. The objective was not only to reduce congestion, but encourage ancillary benefits, such as improving public transport and alleviating environmental damage. The system implemented by IBM and its partners recognised, charged and received payment from vehicles as they passed control points on the way in or out of the Stockholm city center during weekday, rush hour times. The city implemented a free-flow roadside system using laser, camera and systems technology to seamlessly detect, identify and charge vehicles depending on which time of the day they were passing (with higher rates during the rush hours). By the end of the trial phase, traffic was down nearly 25% with an estimated reduction in CO2 of 41,000 tonnes or 8-14% of the normal inner city emissions. Public transport schedules had to be redesigned to reflect the faster travel speed.

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Intel: remote PC management
Intel’s new VPro™ microprocessor technology has major implications for improving efficiency of networked PCs because it enables computers within a network to be managed remotely. This dramatically reduces distances travelled by IT support staff who no longer have to physically access the PC to deal with problems. Moreover, the new processor technology means that individual PCs can be managed even whilst they are switched off, so there is no longer any need to leave PCs on when not in use in order for upgrades or maintenance to be carried out by support staff, since this can now be done when the PCs are powered down. Intel recently implemented this technology for ING, a global provider of financial services, with 114,000 employees spread over 50 countries. In addition to dramatic cost reduction and more streamlined PC management, substantial energy savings were achieved.

View Intel: ING Tackles PC Management Challenges case study (pdf 401.08 KB) more»    

View Intel: Telefonica Transforms IT Troubleshooting case study (pdf 261.32 KB) more»  

Microlise: vehicle telematics and tracking
Microlise provides vehicle telematics technology that monitors how vehicles are being driven. In a recent project involving high density home delivery they were able to show a dramatic improvement in MPG through vehicle monitoring and driver training, and consequently a major reduction in carbon tonnage. Microlise also provides vehicle tracking software that monitors how efficiently vehicles are being utilised with a view to reducing fleet size. The improved certainty has enabled transport operations to be optimised, allowing vehicles to be taken off the road and reducing vehicle miles, by around 1 million km in one year for one of their customers.

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Nokia Logistics and Enterprise Resource Management
As a result of networking, digitalisation of structures and data and RFID applications, ICT plays an increasing role in rendering logistics processes more energy efficient. Stora Enso’s wood logging areas in Finland are connected to pulp mills through an information system based on GSM, GPRS and GPS. The real-time information system contains the wood orders from pulp mills and the logging and transportation programs for each area. It takes as additional inputs the logged and hauled amounts of wood, sent to the system by forest entrepreneurs, and the coordinates of wood trucks from the truck drivers. Based on this information, the system performs real-time operational stock accounting, updates the logging program and devises transportation plans for wood trucks. It then sends the updated information to forest entrepreneurs and truck drivers. More efficient processes and optimised transport mean fewer empty drives and less waste of resources overall.

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OSIsoft: Kodak Park
OSIsoft provide energy management technologies. Kodak Park in New York, USA operates like a small town, with two power plants, 150 buildings, 11,000 employees and covering 1300 acres. There was no central energy management system for the site and many of the buildings operated as silos. OSIsoft provided a single web-based portal for managing energy use across the entire site, which provided real-time data on energy use and consolidated all the different strands of data. It allowed engineers and energy managers to see what was going on, identify areas of waste and address them, then monitor the results and re-adjust if necessary. The system helped Kodak to optimise its energy assets, it identified opportunities for energy reduction and provided critical tools that enabled Kodak to meet their very aggressive energy reduction targets and make savings amounting to several million dollars annually. It also continues to identify new opportunities for energy saving.

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Philips: LED lighting for the National Theatre
Philips and the National Theatre are implementing a programme to replace the landmark London Venue’s lighting scheme with a state of the art, dynamic and energy efficient design. The first phase of the LED lighting solution provided by Philips will focus on the exterior and give the National Theatre a spectacular colour palette, illuminate new areas and provide a new video wall installation on the roof to replace the old dot “seefact” display. The second phase will concentrate on revitalising the internal lighting and improving efficiency, and there will be an ongoing programme of improvement as Philips continues to develop even more sophisticated lighting technology. The LED solution will not only improve a dramatic visual enhancement, it will also reduce the energy needed to light the building’s iconic exterior by 70% and deliver estimated savings of £100,000 per year.

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Philips lighting: Efficeint lighting in offices, streets and homes
In offices and industrial applications, lighting tends to be provided by linear fluorescent tubes. Current products have electromagnetic ballasts. Philips has developed linear fluorescent tubes with energy efficient electronic ballasts which are 61% more energy efficient, saving around 77kg of CO2 during the lifetime of a lamp. Moreover, the new electronic ballast does not have the high copper content of its electromagnetic predecessors and uses fewer materials overall. In streets and highways, Philips has developed a new energy efficient lighting solution called Cosmopolis, which dramatically improves visibility whilst reducing energy demand by 57% - saving €70-130 and reducing emissions by around 600kg CO2 per year. In homes, traditional lighting has been with incandescent bulbs. Currently available technologies such as compact fluorescent bulbs, halogen bulbs and LEDs can reduce the energy demand by 85%, 50% and 82% respectively – between 20 and 34kg of CO2 per lamp. Moreover, compact fluorescent lamps last six times as long as traditional incandescent bulbs.

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Siemens: smart buildings
In Vienna, Siemens building technologies has optimised the energy consumption of the “Brigittenau” indoor pool. The resulting improvements saved the pool operators over £140,000 a year. This industry–leading technology uses specialised algorithms to calculate the actual ventilation and heating requirements and has already been applied to optimise energy efficiency in thousands of buildings world-wide, including hospitals, banks, industrial sites and schools. In Germany, Siemens is a contracting partner for over 1600 buildings, producing savings of over £115million and almost 650,000 tonnes of CO2 during the average contract term of ten years.

Siemens: lighting solutions for Budapest
Siemens has replaced the light bulbs in all of Budapest’s 33,000 traffic lights with LEDs. The monthly instalments paid to Siemens are lower than the savings Budapest generates from reduced energy consumption and the elimination of traffic light maintenance.

Thales: Smart Container Shipping
Thales is currently developing a secure system of container tracking called Smart Container Shipping. Smart container systems are designed to impart intelligence to the container system which can then be used by shippers, owners and customs officials. The smart container is simply a standard container which has sensors, processing capability and communications devices that can interact with a central database over a communications network. The database will also incorporate external data such as cargo manifests and will be accessed through web browsers or manifests. The smart container will provide a tracking and tracing capability to monitor the location and movement of the container, it will protect the integrity of the container and identify whether it has been opened or interfered with in any way, it will monitor the contents – particularly high risk contents – and the content inventory and it will identify the container. The primary objective of this system is to minimise vulnerability to terrorist attack (currently there are opportunities for terrorists to insert unwelcome materials into containers at several stages) but there are a number of substantial environmental benefits, in particular increased efficiency resulting from improved certainty. Goods cannot be lost and shippers know with confidence the conditions under which the goods have been stored (such as ambient temperature, humidity etc), which reduces wastage, and container contents are simply scanned in so physical searches and other interventions are reduced.

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Xerox: carbon footprint calculator
Xerox provide complete document management services for companies with the primary aim of reducing cost and improving efficiency. This process involves scrutinising, analysing and streamlining every aspect of document management. Within this service, Xerox help companies understand their document carbon footprint, using a unique carbon calculator tool that Xerox has developed. The carbon calculator highlights the activities that are having the worst environmental effect so that companies can re-engineer processes if necessary. The carbon calculator also helps to show how intricately economics and sustainability are linked – if companies reduce their document carbon footprint, they will reap the associated rewards of significant cost savings and productivity gains. The key to integrating sustainability is to find mechanisms that not only contribute to overall environmental goals, but which are also commercially viable.