Nearly everyone in the IT world is concerned about the environment, but fewer than two-thirds are doing anything about it.
That's the news in a nutshell from a survey of over 3,100 IT managers in the United Kingdom conducted by iomart and Green IT Magazine. Although nine out of 10 respondents said that the environment was important to their operations, only 38 percent said their companies have incorporated a policy to address their environmental impact.
One of the biggest reasons cited behind the failure to act is ages-old: 95 percent of the IT pros surveyed still haven't seen or been given responsibility for the utility bills in the company -- without knowing how much of a cost-impact the IT department has on the bottom line, there's very little to motivate the kinds of energy efficiency measures that can bring down the budget and environmental cost of computing systems.
Those energy efficiency measures are leading the move to green, the survey found. Two-thirds of respondents said that green IT makes it possible to save significant money while also improving the company's carbon footprint -- though, tellingly, there has still been only minimal movement toward implementing those projects.
"There seems to be a real contradiction within the IT industry. Most IT managers and directors say they are concerned about the environment but very few have taken the time to formulate a green policy or scrutinize where technology costs figure on their company’s electricity bills," Angus McSween, iomart's CEO, said in a statement. "It is a dilemma we as an industry have to address, and soon, but we have to take responsibility for our own energy use if anything is going to change.”
In addition to a lack of access to needed information from within the organization, IT managers also overwhelmingly said that IT manufacturers are not helping -- and possibly even hurting -- the cause of more environmentally friendly computing. The survey found that 72 percent of respondents felt misled by manufacturers' claims about their products, and 66 percent want OEMs to supply more green products than are currently on the market.
"There is clearly a trust issue which has to be overcome," MacSween said. "Even when the will is there, businesses need to be confident the technology in which they invest will deliver the environmental benefits they’re looking for. But technology can only do so much. Businesses need to make sure they’re making the best use of their IT infrastructure and take advantage of available efficiencies.”
The full results from the survey will be published early next year in
Green IT Magazine.
