The Japanese have long been in the forefront of governments which recognize the role of ICT in driving energy efficiency improvements throughout society. The Green IT Promotion Council (GIPC), a joint effort of the Japanese government and the ICT industry, talks about 'green of IT' and 'green by IT.' The former is the increasing energy efficiency of IT devices themselves, and the latter is the ways in which IT, or ICT, can enable greater energy efficiency in other industry sectors and the economy as a whole.
The GIPC and the Intel co-founded Digital Energy Solutions Campaign (DESC) have just inked a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that memorializes a joint desire to work together in promoting 'green by IT' or what we in DESC call the "macro story." A first task under this MOU will collecting and publishing a group of 'best practice' 'Green by IT' solutions. It is intended that this data set will help our joint advocacy efforts as policymakers want more specific illustrations of how a greater investment in ICT can translate into discrete gains in energy efficiency. We hope also to make an explicit link to public policies that can encourage such investment.
