Abstract:
With the recent surge in the use of cloud computing technology, the load on data
centers has massively increased and so has the energy consumption to run these data
centers. Data centers around the globe are huge consumers of energy and produce
amounts of CO2 in return that is alarmingly dangerous for our environment. Globally
several initiatives are being taken to curb the climate change and protect the environment
from harmful gases that are released due to industrial activities and data
center industry is also a part of it. There are several practices towards sustainable
computing that are being promoted at wider scales and even the customer of this age
prefer the industries that are aware of their contribution to a better world. Data center
industry is already under huge influence of several incentives and standards that
set the benchmarks for organizations to strive for green and sustainable solutions
and this massive transformation is going to be more regulated in coming years as the
demand for data centers and the awareness among the people is increasing rapidly.
Against these changing trends the most viable argument is that the shift from traditional
infrastructural practices to these new sustainable practices has huge capital,
operational and recurrent costs. While these claims are true and pose a barrier to
adoption of green solutions available in market yet it is also believed by the regulatory
authorities that since the new trends are not only sustainable but also efficient
so they benefit the organizations through massive savings on energy and operational
costs thus produce a better ROI. The upfront costs are paid back to the companies
through savings within few years and then they can hugely benefit from the savings
and additional generated revenue. In this article we aim to find answers to the cost
relevant barriers in way of green computing adoption for data centers.
