Green challenge for techies: Power down PCs at night

Some techies like to think of themselves as eco-friendly, driving energy-efficient cars, riding mass transit or, better yet, biking to work. On the job, many are involved in data center consolidation and virtualization efforts aimed at slashing electricity costs. But how many techies are willing to go green on their desktops?

That's the question a group of IT vendors is asking as it challenges its own employees and government workers to turn off their PCs, monitors and printers at the end of the workday to save power.

Chill out: Five ways to cut back on data-center power consumption

Next Thursday -- Aug. 27 -- is Power IT Down Day, an awareness-raising event sponsored by Citrix, HP, Intel and Microsoft to encourage employees to hit their power strips as they head out the door for the evening.

"The objective for the day is to raise awareness of what individual consumers of IT can do to impact green IT initiatives, whether in government or private industry," says Tom Simmons, area vice president for Citrix Federal.

Simmons says most IT departments focus on greening their data centers through server virtualization and efficient air conditioning systems, but they don't focus on the client side of green IT, which is a significant portion of an organization's overall electricity usage.

The IT vendors involved in Power IT Down Day say it saves an average of 13 kilowatt hours of electricity per person per evening if employees shut down their CPUs, monitors and printers from 5 p.m. until 8 a.m. the next day.

It's the second annual Power IT Down Day, which was started by Citrix's public sector group to encourage its government customers to save energy by turning off their PCs at night. Citrix planned the event for August, when electricity consumption is at its peak due to air conditioning usage.

Last year, Power IT Down Day attracted 2,800 participants who saved more than 36,000 kilowatt hours of electricity. So far, the 2009 Power IT Down Day has attracted more than 1,100 participants.

More registrations are due early next week, as CIOs of participating organizations send out internal e-mail asking employees to participate in Power IT Down Day. Citrix hopes to have at least 3,100 participants.

Anyone can participate in the 2009 Power IT Down Day. You can register here.

Simmons says powering down your PC, monitor and printer has other benefits besides electricity savings. Systems are more secure because rather than being in idle mode they need to be rebooted in order for them to be hacked. Additionally, CPUs and printers last longer if their power is turned off for eight hours at a time.

"But the primary objective is the energy savings," Simmons says.

With so many benefits, what keeps techies from powering down every night? Habit, Simmons says. After last year's Power IT Down Day, Simmons started powering down his laptop, monitor and printer before leaving for the day. "I've built a new habit where I shut all that down, and then I flip the switch on my power strip so there's no electrical draw on any of those devices," he says.