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Below, you'll find extensive information, and carbon offset articles and products to help you with your interest in our evironment.

The Business Of Being Green

Does your business take green IT seriously? Well it should, because ignoring could cost you money and harm your credibility.

There are now over 1.1 billion computers in operation worldwide, collectively producing about one billion tonnes of CO2 through their electricity requirements. E-waste is serious headache too with computers, mobile phones and electronic gadgets now accounting for 5% of the world's garbage (www.unep.org).

But surely small IT companies don't need to be worrying about that kind of thing? Actually, they do - there are solid reasons why all businesses should be going greener, and not just because of the do-gooder's warm fuzzy feelings to be had! Over 70% of PCs will not be recycled when disposed of over the next five years, and globally we will dispose of 512 million. We are now legally obliged to dispose of PC equipment properly, and that normally incurs charges. Thankfully there is a free and simple, if underused, alternative; lots of people in the world are in dire need of our "outdated" computers, so donate them to the likes of www.computeraid.org. For safety, I would suggest you scrub your drives first (try dban.sourceforge.net). More regulation info at www.netregs.gov.uk.

Perhaps more importantly, consumers and businesses are increasingly taking note of how the products and services they use impact the environment. Memset (www.memset.com) became the UK's first "carbon neutral" Web host last Summer and that has definitely helped us win more business, which is also probably why so many other dedicated server hosts are following suit.

Carbon offsetting

Things like travel, electricity usage and product manufacture have a "carbon footprint"; the quantity of greenhouse gases directly or indirectly produced as a result of those activities. Most activities are impossible to make 100% green, but you can offset the effective carbon impact by investing in carbon sequestration projects (eg. planting trees) or in greener power generation facilities (eg. wind farms), thus becoming "carbon neutral".

Organisations like the CarbonNeutral Company (www.carbonneutral.com) and the Carbon Trust (www.carbontrust.co.uk) can guide you through offsetting, and it is neither expensive nor difficult. For example, an average small office with 10 staff might have equivalent emissions of 20 tonnes CO2/year, which would probably only cost around £200/year to offset.

As well as giving you more credibility in today's increasingly enviro-friendly world, taking a few hours to review your carbon footprint can lead to some worthwhile cost savings as well. A simple example is turning off (or hibernating if, like me, you hate rebooting and getting back to where you were each morning) your PC at night. A recent study by Fujitsu estimated that the UK alone wastes £123m on electricity powering PCs left on out-of-hours. See www.energysavingtrust.org.uk for general energy-efficiency tips.

Virtually greener

Carbon offsetting is all good stuff, but when it comes to IT power consumption, prevention is better than cure. Demand for high-availability, centralised server resource is growing relentlessly, and high-density computing uses a lot of energy. Even a base-spec 1U rackmount server will burn 100-200 Watts continuously, and once you fill a few racks and add in cooling requirements you are looking at a whopping electricity bill! With energy prices doubling every few years datacentres' power consumption is fast becoming a major issue for IT business, and is now the main cost underlying server hosting.

The oddity from our perspective is that the vast bulk of servers in our datacentres idle most of the time, with perhaps 90% never getting close to full capacity. While many applications are best hosted on their own dedicated server (better security, for example), few need the full resource of a modern multi-core, gigahertz machine. That is where virtualisation comes in; the latest generation of virtual machines, using the hardware-assisted virtualisation in new AMD and Intel's chips (eg. www.vmware.com, www.miniserver.com), are operationally indistinguishable from a physical server but use 5-20% of the electricity. The reduced power and hardware costs give you significant savings while not costing anything you actually needed in the first place, and at the same time you are tackling climate change.

It can be argued that all such measures are a dribble in the ocean, and some have serious doubts about the efficacy of our whole approach to climate change. However, being more climate-friendly is not difficult for most IT businesses and almost certainly helps, so can you really afford to ignore the risks, or miss out on the benefits of going greener?

Article written by Kate Craig Wood
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CNN global warming misinformation makes its way to <em>The Radio Factor</em>
On <em>The Radio Factor</em>, guest host Douglas Urbanski cited a December 18 segment from CNN's <em>Lou Dobbs Tonight</em> to support the assertion, which has been widely discredited, that "man-made climate change" is "one of the biggest lies of our time" and in doing so echoed several of the debunked claims and suggestions about global warming included in that CNN segment.
"Winter storm" causes Dobbs to ask: "What's that global warming deal?"
Lou Dobbs said during the introduction of his CNN show: "And tonight, unusual winter storms are dumping snow in unusual places across Western states, and a huge snowstorm is headed toward the Northeast. This is global warming?" During his segment on the issue, Dobbs hosted Heartland Institute senior fellow and science director Jay Lehr without disclosing that Heartland receives funding from the energy industry and without challenging Lehr's assertions that "[t]he last 10 years have been quite cool" and that "the sun" -- rather than humans -- is responsible for recent climate change.
Levin cited "global cooling" study to dismiss efforts to "control carbon dioxide" emissions, ignoring warning by study's co-author not to do so
On his radio show, Mark Levin cited a recent study predicting that an ice age will occur in the next 10,000 to 100,000 years as purported evidence that humans should not "try and control carbon dioxide" emissions that contribute to global climate change. But Levin did not mention that the study's co-author reportedly warned against using the study to argue that "we should stop fighting warming" and stated: "There's no excuse for saying 'we've got to keep pumping carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.' "
Milwaukee radio host smeared "greedy, overpaid unionized schoolteacher[s]" who talk about global warming
On his Milwaukee radio talk show, Mark Belling referred to schoolteachers who talk to their students about global warming as "idiot union teacher[s]," "liberal unionized hack[s]," "greedy, overpaid unionized schoolteacher[s]," and "fruitcake[s]."
Hannity compared carbon offsets to "cheat[ing] on your wife," ignored Murdoch's efforts to make News Corp. carbon neutral
On <em>Hannity &amp; Colmes</em>, Sean Hannity criticized the purchase of credits to offset one's "carbon footprint," asserting, "Those offsets -- that is the biggest hoax in the world. ... You know what it's like? You go cheat on your wife, and then say, 'Honey, but don't worry. I bought an offset.' Good luck." Hannity has yet to address the pledge by News Corp. chairman and CEO Rupert Murdoch "to be carbon neutral, across all our businesses" -- which includes Fox News -- "by 2010."
Discussing TCPR claims, O'Reilly said he'd "like to hear [Gore's] side of things," but ignored Gore's response to TCPR
Bill O'Reilly asserted: "The Tennessee Center for Policy Research [TCPR] says the former vice president [Al Gore] is still using a massive amount of energy at his Tennessee mansion -- more than 20 times the national average." O'Reilly later stated: "So it looks like Gore is a pinhead, but we would like to hear his side of things. And he has an open invitation to appear on the <em>Factor</em>." But at no point did O'Reilly mention that Gore has reportedly given "his side of things" in response to a June 17 TCPR press release on the subject of Gore's purported energy use.
Hume claimed Gore's "energy use has surged more than 10 percent," ignored Gore's response that it's all "green power"
On <em>Special Report</em>, citing purported findings by the Tennessee Center for Policy Research, Brit Hume claimed that Al Gore's "energy use has surged more than 10 percent" since environmentally friendly renovations were completed on his home. Hume offered no response from Gore. Responding to the charge, a Gore spokeswoman stated that "[w]hen [the Gores] do use power, it's green power." According to the Tennessee Valley Authority, green power "create[s] less waste and pollution" than standard electricity.
<em>Wash. Times</em>' Pruden falsely claimed that "the earth has been measurably cooling for the last decade"
In a <em>Washington Times</em> column, Wesley Pruden falsely claimed that "the earth has been measurably cooling for the last decade, despite everything [former Vice President] Al [Gore] and his followers have done about it." In fact, the United Kingdom's Met (Meteorological) Office lists as a "fact" that "[t]emperatures are continuing to rise" and states that "temperature change over the latest decade (1998-2007) alone shows a continued warming of 0.1&deg; C per decade."
MSNBC hosted Breaux and Lott to defend oil and gas companies -- but failed to note they're lobbyists for them
On <em>MSNBC Live</em>, Andrea Mitchell discussed energy policy with former Sens. John Breaux and Trent Lott but failed to disclose that both are lobbyists for major oil and gas companies. While Mitchell said that Lott and Breaux "formed a firm" together, she did not note that their firm conducts lobbying or that its clients include oil and gas companies Chevron, Shell, and Plains Exploration &amp; Production Co.
Beck revived falsehood that Bill Clinton said, "We've got to slow down our economy" to fight global warming
On his nationally syndicated radio show, Glenn Beck falsely claimed that former President Bill Clinton said, "We've got to slow down our economy" in order to combat global warming, and aired a portion of a speech Clinton made in January. However, as Clinton's full remarks make clear, he did not suggest "slow[ing] down our economy" to fight global warming.
Jonah Goldberg misrepresented Gore's comments about Hurricane Katrina
In his <em>Los Angeles Times</em> column, Jonah Goldberg asserted that in an NPR interview, Al Gore "chuckled" at the idea that Hurricane Katrina "was God's wrath for New Orleans' sexual depravity," then "went on to blame Katrina on man's energy sinfulness." In fact, Gore stated during the interview that "any individual storm can't be linked singularly to global warming." Goldberg also claimed that the numbers of polar bears "have quadrupled in the last 50 years"; in fact, data to support estimates of the polar bear population 50 years ago are reportedly nonexistent, recent growth in the polar bear population is believed to be linked to hunting bans, and the Department of Interior found that "the polar bear is likely to become an endangered species within the foreseeable future."
Previewing McCain's environment speech, Reuters did not mention his voting record or include criticisms of his positions
Reuters reported that Sen. John McCain would pledge "to take the lead in combating global climate change if elected president in a speech that set him apart from the policies of U.S. President George W. Bush." However, in reporting on McCain's environmental positions that his campaign believes will "win support from independents and centrist Democrats," Reuters did not mention his voting record and did not include any criticism of McCain's positions. By contrast, <em>The Washington Post</em> noted that "McCain's lifetime League of Conservation Voters score is 24 percent, compared with 86 for Obama and 86 for Clinton."
Fox's Baier misrepresented Gore's comments about Myanmar cyclone
Fox News' Bret Baier claimed that in an interview on NPR, "Former Vice President Al Gore says global warming is to blame for the cyclone in Myanmar." In fact, while Gore did discuss the cyclone in the context of global warming, he also stated -- just moments earlier -- that "any individual storm can't be linked singularly to global warming."
Fox's E.D. Hill falsely claimed that "U.N. meteorologists" say "the planet may actually cool off for the 10th year in a row"
On<em> America's Pulse</em>, host E.D. Hill falsely claimed, in a teaser for an upcoming segment, that "the U.N. says the planet may actually cool off for the 10th year in a row." Hill later asserted: "U.N. meteorologists now saying that we could have, for the 10th year in a row, a colder year, temperatures ... decreasing, not warming, getting colder." In fact, global mean temperatures, as measured in two widely used data sets, have not decreased in each of the past 10 years; further, according to those data sets' producers, the data continue to show a long-term warming trend.
<em>NY Times</em> understated Inhofe's views on global warming
In an article discussing potentially competitive 2008 Senate elections, <em>The New York Times</em> understated Sen. James Infohe's views on global warming, reporting that Inhofe "has said that its effects are exaggerated." In fact, Inhofe has repeatedly referred to global warming as the "greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people" and reportedly compared Al Gore's global warming documentary to Adolf Hitler's <em>Mein Kampf</em>.

Additional Resources The Perks Of Global Warming By Nola Kelsey, Fri Dec 9th Marya Mannes once wrote, "The earth we abuse and the livingthings we kill will, in the end, take their revenge; for inexploiting their presence we are diminishing our future."Obviously Ms. Mannes Read more...

Additional Resources Global Warming: Why Consumers And Insurers Are Getting Hot Under The Collar Over Life Insurance. By Rachel Lane Global warming may have been lurking on our horizon for a number of years and historical records of terrorists have existed for thousands of years, but we are coming into a new age where we try and Read more...

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