Environmental impact of a server and network monitoring solution
While preparing the official launch of our Monitoring Appliance, we have spent some time studying the environmental impact of a monitoring solution.
A monitoring solution (Open Source, freeware or commercial) is installed on a server which needs electricity to power and cool it.
The hard thing to find is: how much power does a server use on average. There is one known study that was published by AMD and made by Stanford's Consulting Professor Jonathan Koomey.
He identifies in his study 3 types of servers: volume, mid-range and highend. Most monitoring solutions run on a volume server.
Stats are based on 2005.
When looking at the total number of volume servers deployed and the total energy used by them you get an average power consumption of 438 Watt per server.
A monitoring solution runs 24x365. So how do we calculate the power consumption for a "traditional" server monitoring and network monitoring solution?
438 Watt is 0.438 kWh. The calculation is 0.438x24x365 = 3,836 kWh
What does that mean in CO2 emission? The US Government makes Energy statistics periodically available through the Energy Information Administration. The report can be viewed here:
http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oiaf/1605/cdrom/pdf/e-supdoc.pdf
The PDF tells us that on average 1.34 lbs CO2 is emitted per kWh energy produced.
CO2 emission is 1.34 * 3836 or 5140 lbs or 2.3 metric tons!
A quick search on the Internet showed that to compensate that CO2 offset 24 trees are needed.
One solution could be virtualization to reduce power consumption. A non-confirmed study showed that an average 5 virtual servers are put on one physical machine. Often a higher powered server is then used instead of a volume server. Average power consumption needed for a mid-range server is 10852 kWh per year or 3 times more. Per virtual server this is 2829 kWh per year
An electricity saving per system of 25% is reached. Expressed in CO2 emission this is still 1.7 metric tons CO2 emission.
As a Google engineer once suggested, the real savings are coming when power usage of server goes down.
The ServersCheck's Server and Network Monitoring Appliance is our effort in that area. A small low powered CPU using up to 15 Watts. Power usage per year: 131 kWh per year, a CO2 emission of 79kg. 30 times less than a volume server.
A monitoring solution (Open Source, freeware or commercial) is installed on a server which needs electricity to power and cool it.
The hard thing to find is: how much power does a server use on average. There is one known study that was published by AMD and made by Stanford's Consulting Professor Jonathan Koomey.
He identifies in his study 3 types of servers: volume, mid-range and highend. Most monitoring solutions run on a volume server.
Stats are based on 2005.
When looking at the total number of volume servers deployed and the total energy used by them you get an average power consumption of 438 Watt per server.
A monitoring solution runs 24x365. So how do we calculate the power consumption for a "traditional" server monitoring and network monitoring solution?
438 Watt is 0.438 kWh. The calculation is 0.438x24x365 = 3,836 kWh
What does that mean in CO2 emission? The US Government makes Energy statistics periodically available through the Energy Information Administration. The report can be viewed here:
http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oiaf/1605/cdrom/pdf/e-supdoc.pdf
The PDF tells us that on average 1.34 lbs CO2 is emitted per kWh energy produced.
CO2 emission is 1.34 * 3836 or 5140 lbs or 2.3 metric tons!
A quick search on the Internet showed that to compensate that CO2 offset 24 trees are needed.
One solution could be virtualization to reduce power consumption. A non-confirmed study showed that an average 5 virtual servers are put on one physical machine. Often a higher powered server is then used instead of a volume server. Average power consumption needed for a mid-range server is 10852 kWh per year or 3 times more. Per virtual server this is 2829 kWh per year
An electricity saving per system of 25% is reached. Expressed in CO2 emission this is still 1.7 metric tons CO2 emission.
As a Google engineer once suggested, the real savings are coming when power usage of server goes down.
The ServersCheck's Server and Network Monitoring Appliance is our effort in that area. A small low powered CPU using up to 15 Watts. Power usage per year: 131 kWh per year, a CO2 emission of 79kg. 30 times less than a volume server.
posted by ServersCheck at
8:17 PM
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