More than one third of IT executives say their firm does not monitor its IT-related energy spending, according to new research.

The global survey sponsored by IBM titled IT and the environment: a new item on the CIO's agenda? was carried out by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) to assess organisations’ efforts to measure and reduce the environmental impact of IT.

Although there is high visibility of environmental issues, few businesses have anything approaching a cohesive strategy for dealing with it from an IT perspective, says the EIU report.

Of those firms that monitor IT energy use, almost a quarter have seen their energy consumption increase over the past two years.

Although concerns about energy efficiency and global warming are now high on the political agenda, the spotlight has not yet been turned onto the IT function, said EIU report editor, James Watson.

"This survey suggests that few firms have woken up to the fact that their IT infrastructure is already responsible for a significant proportion of their total energy costs,” said Watson.

More than half of executives polled agree that their firm does not measure the environmental impact of its IT systems and policies, with only one third saying they do.

The report suggests that this is, in part, due to the lack of visibility about the issue: 64 per cent of respondents agree that an industry standard on energy efficiency for IT equipment would cause them to change their procurement policies.