By Enterprise Innovation Editors | Dec 21, 2009

At least 5.8 billion tons of CO2 emissions could be reduced by 2020 if companies continue with the focused use of seventeen core technologies in four major economic sectors, namely energy, transport, buildings, and industry, an IDC report on ICT sustainability announced early December.

The estimate represents the potential reduction in greenhouse gases for just the G20 nations. Further reductions in global CO2 emissions could be realized if more countries used ICT-based solutions to their full potential.

"ICT will be an important source of practical solutions for reducing CO2 emissions in the G20 and many other countries," said Roberta Bigliani, research director at IDC Energy Insights. "Any goals to reduce energy consumption, for example, will be accelerated by using network-based solutions as a foundation. Similarly, ICT can enable more effective monitoring and management of energy use in many key sectors of a nation's economy. Although ICT is not a panacea, its full potential has not yet been put to use."

In developing the CO2 reduction model, IDC’s criterion for selecting ICT solutions were simple and clear. "The core technologies had to pass three tests: they had to be mature enough to provide real benefits within three years, support significant processing on a network, and be discrete independent technologies," said Philip Carter, associate research director for Green IT & Sustainability Research.

The study also acknowledges that core ICT – the datacenter and communications infrastructure that underpins the emissions-reducing technologies – needs to scale in order to achieve the energy savings and associated emissions reductions. Chris Ingle, associate vice president of Consulting at IDC, said, "As technologies have become more powerful and more widely used to support carbon emissions reduction, the emissions from powering those technologies, and the cost of powering them, have grown. Any plan for reducing carbon emissions should include an evaluation of the emissions from core ICT infrastructure. At the same time, ICT itself needs to optimize at all levels. In addition to the rack and datacenter, planners need to consider the use of energy efficient technologies in their infrastructure as a whole, including client and print."

The results of IDC's CO2-reduction research, including the national scores from the ICT Sustainability IndexT and policy recommendations on how ICT investments can contribute to achieving climate change goals, will be released at an international press conference to be held Thursday, 10 December 2009 (13:30 - 17:00 CET) at the Skuespilhuset (The Playhouse) in Copenhagen, Denmark. An event summary, agenda, and press registration can be found online at: http://www.idc.com/events/climate.