For many businesses and employees, moving to Cloud-based technologies such as Google Suite, Salesforce or AWS represent clear environmental benefits. On one hand, it reduces the need for paper based files and allows employees to work remotely, reducing emissions linked to commuting. On the other hand, economies of scale can be achieved from a cost and equipment perspective which would not be possible if each individual company had to run its own server structure locally.
However, the downside and often overlooked aspect of Cloud technology, is the number of resources required to run Cloud-based applications and store the data contained in them. To put things in perspective, the internet currently has a larger carbon footprint than the aviation industry and when the song ‘Despacito’ hit 5 billion views on Youtube, it burned as much energy as 40,000 US homes in a year. This is because every click, every data point created or edited and interaction with a Cloud-based application has to be recorded. And the Cloud, contrary to what the name suggests, does not sit on thin air but on a large number of servers found in gigantic data centers all around the globe.
As you will have understood, from funny cat memes to your emails or customer records on Salesforce, the internet is powered by energy. A lot of it. Based on the latest statistics from the Institute for Energy, only 16% of primary energy supply of OECD Europe countries was provided by renewables. This means that the energy used to power the internet in Europe mostly comes from oil, gas, coal and nuclear energy.
So where do we go from here? Cloud-based technologies are not about to disappear. If anything, they will only get more prominent. How do we make our tech greener?
Hold your Cloud application providers accountable
When subscribing to a new business application or software, ask the service provider what actions they are undertaking in order to reduce their tech’s carbon footprint. Some Cloud-based services such as Apple are choosing to power their centers using 100% renewable energy sources such as solar, geothermal, hydropower resources, and wind. Google and Microsoft are building data centers in countries where green energy is readily available, such as in Scandinavian countries where geothermal energy is commonly used and cheap.
Get rid of unnecessary data
To some degree, most businesses own and store poor quality data or even unnecessary information. Besides doing yourself a favour, giving your data a good scrub and getting rid of unnecessary or duplicate data will reduce your company’s environmental footprint as less server space is taken up by it. In addition, ensuring your applications are well connected to each other to allow for information sharing between them will reduce the need to hold the same information in multiple places.
At Salesforce, the environment is considered a key stakeholder in strategic decision making. In addition to driving operational excellence at their data centers in order to reduce their carbon footprint, Salesforce offsets the remaining emissions by purchasing carbon credits which support sustainable development projects around the globe. Thanks to both of these initiatives, Salesforce has achieved net-zero emissions for its operations globally and delivers a carbon neutral cloud to its customers.
To many it is clear that efficiencies achieved thanks to Cloud-computing outweigh the negatives. However, this does not mean that businesses should close their eyes on the environmental impacts of this technology. By reducing our data requirements and asking for environmental accountability and transparency from Cloud-service providers, we can have the best of both worlds.
The team at Trigg Digital are here to help. With a focus on being friendly and accessible, highly cost-effective and with a laser-sharp focus on maximising your ROI, we pledge to optimise CRM processes to grow your business. Get in touch on +44 203 239 8492 or at hello@triggdigital.com
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