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Business Green: How to draw up a green travel policy

In a perfectly sustainable world, drafting a green travel policy document would involve little more than grabbing a sheet of A4 paper and scribbling the words "all business travel is banned henceforth" in bright green felt-tip pen. The simplest and most effective way to make business travel more sustainable is to take a default position that it shouldn't happen and then make anyone who disagrees justify why a business trip is necessary. Unfortunately, back in the real world, some sort of busin… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on January 27, 2010 at 1:30pm — No Comments

eWEEK: Toxic Tech Group Slams Avatar 3D TV Upgrades

A US environmental group has criticised the companies behind science fiction film Avatar for promoting 3D technology, which the charity believes will lead to consumers unnecessarily upgrading TVs and consigning the old technology to the waste stream. In a blog posting late last week, Silicon Valley Toxic Co… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on January 27, 2010 at 1:22pm — No Comments

eWEEK: $100 Laptop Project Recruiting Haiti Volunteers

The earthquake-hit country is just one of the destinations where the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) organisation wants to send interns and volunteers The One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) project, which has developed a low-cost notebook computer to help children in developing countries improve computer and learning skills, has announced that it is looking for volunteers and interns to help out with projects in countries including Afghanistan and Haiti. The OLPC organisation announced this week that it… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on January 27, 2010 at 1:19pm — No Comments

eWEEK: MOD Deploys Green Driving Tech

The UK's Ministry of Defence (MOD) has announced that it is adopting technology which should help cut road accidents and also improve the sustainability of the organisation's own vehicles. The MOD announced late in December that it has signed a contract with sustainable driving technology specialist GreenRoad, which will cover around 4,500 vehicles in the MOD fleet for the next three years. Although the deployment is being discussed mainly in terms of reducing accidents from reckless driving, G… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on January 27, 2010 at 1:16pm — No Comments

eWEEK Europe UK: Microsoft Pushes Green Mapping Amid Copenhagen Talks

Tech giant Microsoft has joined the likes of Cisco and Intel, who are keen to bask in the green glow from the summit Microsoft has joined the ranks of IT companies showing off their green credentials at the Copenhagen climate talks with the launch of its Environmental Atlas of Europe project. The tool, announced this week, is essentially an online… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on December 17, 2009 at 4:13pm — No Comments

eWEEK Europe UK: Microsoft-Backed Green Search Engine Attacks Google

Ecosia is being endorsed by the WWF and billed as an "eco-friendly" search engine but it is also based on Microsoft technology A search engine project backed by the World Wildlife Fund, and based on technology from Microsoft and Yahoo, heavily criticises the carbon intensity of Google's search infrastructure and also contains a sly dig at Apple. The Ecosia search engine announced this week in the… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on December 6, 2009 at 7:33pm — No Comments

eWEEK Europe UK: Green Experts Pour Cold Water On Sweating IT Assets

The Green Grid's John Tuccillo and Zhal Limbuwala from the British Computer Society argue that consuming less IT and upgrading less frequently isn't necessarily the most sustainable approach IT vendors are very keen on discussing environmental and low-carbon approaches to IT in terms of energy efficiency. The idea that new technology will be more efficient and "greener" than older kit fits nicely with the perpetual upgrade mantra that has been the mainstay of the computing industry since… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on December 6, 2009 at 2:40pm — No Comments

eWEEK Europe UK: UK Tightens Tech Recycling - While Toxic Waste Leaks To Africa

In the same week that the UK updated its electronics recycling laws, a Nigerian national has been questioned by police over the illegal export of waste technology The UK has updated its main regulations governing the environmental disposal of used IT and other tech hardware but cases are still emerging of electronic waste being shipped illegally to developin… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on November 14, 2009 at 4:42pm — No Comments

eWeek Europe UK: IBM: Fossil Fuel Companies Are Climate Change Victims, Not Perpetrators

Skirting carefully around the fact that fossil fuels contribute to climate change, IBM has plenty of advice for how oil and gas companies can respond to the threat from global warming Along with other large IT companies such as HP, IBM appears to have an extremely pragmatic take on climate change. Keen to be seen to be green with a rash of carbon-cutting services and "green" hardware, the vendor is also happy to profit from the lucrative contracts available from oil and gas companies' continui… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on November 5, 2009 at 5:15pm — No Comments

eWeek Europe UK: Microsoft Sends Mixed Messages On Consumption

Microsoft is encouraging adoption of its Windows 7 operating system - even if that means replacing working XP machines - but is still critical of unbridled consumption While on the one hand Microsoft is pushing consumers and businesses to trade in functioning PCs for shiny new devices running Windows 7, on the other the computer giant is characterising the boom years that preceded the current recession as unsustainable and unrealistic. In a statement released this week, designed to push the ef… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on November 5, 2009 at 5:13pm — No Comments

BusinessGreen: Campaigners warn carbon markets will trigger next sub-prime crisis

Carbon cap-and-trade schemes are a dangerous distraction and could trigger the next sub-prime financial crisis, according to environmental campaigners and academics. In a report released today, Friends of The Earth says that carbon markets have been hijacked by financial organisations that are creating ever more complex products which echo the mism… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on November 5, 2009 at 5:00pm — No Comments

eWeek Europe UK: Government Denies Price Hikes Will Negate Smart Grid Savings

Despite estimates that energy prices could increase by as much as 60 percent, the government has said smart metering could help cut bills in the long term Concerns that rises in energy costs of up to 60 percent by 2020 could effectively wipe-out any reduction in bills offered by the introduction of smart meters and grids have been denied by the government. Speaking to eWeek Europe UK, a spokersperson for the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) said that it was wrong to sugges… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on October 11, 2009 at 3:45pm — No Comments

eWeek Europe UK: VMWare Responds To "Green" Hydroelectric Criticism

Environmentalists have criticised VMWare's choice of hydroelectric power for the damage damming causes salmon stocks and local communities Virtualisation specialist VMWare has responded to criticism from environmentalists for its use of hydroelectric power in a new facility that it claims has set "the gold standard" for green data centre design. Earlier this week, VMWare announced that it had opened a US data centre in Washington State. The virtualisation software maker claimed that by… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on October 9, 2009 at 1:30pm — No Comments

eWeek Europe UK: Environmentalists Dispute VMWare's "Green" Hydroelectric Claims

The virtualisation specialist claims its latest data centre is "the gold standard" for green design powered as it is solely by hydroelectric energy but environmental groups claim electricity generated from damming rivers is not sustainable or particularly green Virtualisation software maker VMWare has said it will save $5m a year with its new data ce… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on October 8, 2009 at 9:00am — No Comments

eWeek Europe UK: Consumers Demand Minimum Smart Meter Standards

With a 2020 target set for smart meter roll out to UK households and businesses, organisations including the Energy Saving Trust are pushing for minimum standards for the devices Research by the Energy Saving Trust into the optimum design for in-home smart displays has revealed that consumers want the devices to have clear visual displays which show real-time electricity or gas consumption. According to the report, The Smart Way To Display, released this week from the government funded… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on October 5, 2009 at 4:43pm — No Comments

eWeek Europe UK: HP Claims Oil Profits Don't Tarnish Green Image

Senior executives from HP's energy and environmental divisions have defended the company's green credentials despite its policy of profiting from fossil fuel production exploration. Hewlett-Packard is commited to cutting its own carbon emissions, but it is also happy to profit directly from the tools and services it sells to utility companies for fossil fuel production and exploration, said the European chairman of HP's environmental board Klaus Hieronymi at HP's 9th Executive Energy Conference… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on October 3, 2009 at 11:56am — No Comments

eWeek Europe UK: Cheap Energy Leads To Waste, Warns Green Guru

The only way to curb emissions is to put up energy prices, former German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer told an HP event

A sustainable approach to energy use can only be driven by higher prices Germany's former Foreign Minister has warned a conference run by Hewlett-Packard. Businesses and consumers will not begin to use energy in a sustainable way until higher costs force them to take a m… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on October 3, 2009 at 11:52am — No Comments

Science fiction can tackle the science facts of climate change

The contents of a report outlining what health provision might look like in 2030 might sound fantastical but tackling climate change is going to require some very imaginative technology and radical thinking

The Terminator or Star Trek? While an abiding interest in either of these science-fiction classics might be an admission… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on September 30, 2009 at 11:00am — No Comments

eWeek Europe UK: Microsoft Joins OASIS Standard For Smart Grids

Microsoft puts aside past rivalry with OASIS over document formats, to joins its campaign for smart meter standards International standards organisation OASIS has launched a new group aimed at developing standards to promote the adoption of so-called smart energy grids - and welcomed past rival Microsoft on board. Open standards body OASIS said this week that it has formed the Energy Interoperation Technical Committee to develop web services for dealing with the communication systems for smart… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on August 26, 2009 at 4:59pm — No Comments

eWeek Europe UK: UK Utilities Deny Lobbying Against Smart Meters

Experts in the field of sustainability are almost unanimous when it comes to the secret of any truly successful push for efficiency - getting the right metrics. But according to accusations doing the rounds this week, not everyone is entirely on board when it comes to consumer and businesses getting accurate information on energy usage provided by smart meters which the government has mandated should be installed in every home in the UK by 2020. According to a report in the Times, the Local Go… Continue

Added by Andrew Donoghue on August 21, 2009 at 5:15pm — No Comments

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