Following the recent Stern report, WEEE legislation, rising energy costs, fluctuating copper prices and the UN’s IPCC report on climate change, environmental concerns are beginning to influence business strategies.

Company boards and network managers are increasingly keen to promote a green approach, particularly if this leads to greater efficiency and improved performance. Developments in network architecture design and the technologies used can minimise the long-term costs to business and to the planet.

There is a range of incentives for companies to become greener, both from an IT viewpoint and a broader organisational perspective.

Initial motivation is the moral and social obligation and the associated benefits that a positive green company image brings. Ethical marketing can also be a very powerful tool.

But the major reason for companies to go green is the financial advantage. The continuing rise in energy and fuel costs and the high price of power and air conditioning means that going green can lead to a reduction in outgoing costs.

Additionally, standards such as BS EN ISO14001 are indicators of a company’s environmental awareness, and could become a key requirement for companies competing for business, particularly in the public sector. Also, BREAM ratings for buildings are now evaluated. This is a scheme run by the Building Research Establishment and assesses the performance of buildings in areas such as energy and materials use, land use, pollution and emissions, water use and ecology.

There are several technology solutions that can assist in managing the above issues and moving towards a greener approach. Converging voice, data, audio-visual and other applications to a single network brings cost and energy savings.

Instead of coaxial cable running alongside a telephone network with a separate data network within each building, a single IP network is becoming the norm. Higher bandwidth over copper and fibre resulting from new protocols and hardware lengthens the lifespan of networks. Wireless networking further empowers IT directors to provide services without heavy infrastructure investment.

Centralisation and software as a service are helping to move IT hardware from busy, hot, expensive offices to dedicated data centres.

Thin-client devices require a fraction of the power of PCs, and the lack of moving parts extends the lifespan from fewer than three years to more than five. Hosted applications mean PCs no longer need the latest processors. The processing power, storage and energy consumption is becoming centralised to a data centre.

Being green means having a strategy and an awareness of the implications of any decision.

Whether or not programmes are formalised into an environmental management system and crystallised by achieving ISO14001 and related accreditations, IT is waking up to the PR benefits, and the tangible financial benefits, of being green and being associated with green products and services.

The ethical considerations are stacking up alongside the compliance and regulatory considerations.

Rajesh Sinha is technical director at Bailey Teswaine and a BCS contributor