IBM yesterday announced it is investing $1bn (£0.5m) a year to increase energy efficiency within its own IT departments and those of its clients.

'Project Big Green,' will target corporate data centres and includes a new global 'green team' of more than 850 energy efficiency architects from across IBM.

The plan includes new products and services for IBM and its clients to reduce data center energy consumption by an average of 42 per cent.

'The data centre energy crisis is inhibiting our clients’ business growth as they seek to access computing power,' said Mike Daniels, senior vice president, IBM Global Technology Services.

'Many data centers have now reached full capacity, limiting a firm’s ability to grow and make necessary capital investments. Today we are providing clients the IBM action plan to make their data centers fully utilised and energy efficient.'

Energy spending has how reached 50 per cent of hardware spending, according to analyst IDC, and  is expected to increase to 70 per cent over the next four years.

By using the same energy efficiency initiatives it is offering clients today, IBM aims to double the computing capacity of its data centers within the next three years without increasing power consumption.

Compared to doubling the size of its data centers by building out new space, IBM expects this will help save more than five billion kilowatt hours of energy per year.