Cloud computing is among the fundamental technologies that have completely changed the computing world in the last 10 to 15 years. Many companies are deploying their software and data to cloud servers to lower their overall computing costs and to also have access to all their digital resources on the go.
Despite the financial benefits, cloud computing also has several benefits to the environment compared to relying on local servers. In this article, we will walk you through the environmental benefits of cloud computing and how businesses and individuals can use the cloud to reduce their overall carbon footprint.
Why Cloud Computing is Good for the Environment
1. Lowers the overall energy consumption
Using cloud computing is equivalent to using public transport. With cloud computing, businesses don’t have to procure and deploy powerful hardware at their premises. All they need are capable computers that they can use to access the cloud servers where their data or software is deployed since the computing is done in the cloud.
This minimizes the overall power that businesses need to run their computing infrastructure. It is also important to note that cloud computing also enables businesses to pay and use the exact hardware resources they need at a time. This improves efficiency in operations, which eventually reduces the overall energy required for computing.
Reducing energy consumption is a net positive for the environment since it reduces carbon emissions generated during energy production. Ultimately using cloud computing will reduce the carbon footprint of your business due to lower emissions created as a result of your computing needs.
2. No need to make frequent hardware upgrades
One of the main reasons businesses and individuals are shifting to cloud computing is the reduction in costs spent on computing hardware. With cloud computing, businesses also don’t have to frequently upgrade their hardware because they don’t rely on it to do heavy computing and data storage.
Ultimately, this reduces the number of computers and servers that are sold every year. Without cloud computing, more servers would be sold every year to meet the changing computing needs of businesses. Cloud computing has saved us all the carbon emissions that would be generated from the production and distribution of servers to companies that upgrade their hardware more frequently.
Besides companies, the hardware needs also apply to individuals. For instance, more people now opt not to buy hardware storage because they have the option to store their data on cloud storage platforms such as Google Drive and iCloud. This lowers the number of hard drives that have to be produced and shipped to customers every year.
3. Most cloud platforms use renewable energy.
Most of the big tech companies, including Google, Facebook, Microsoft, and Apple, use 100% renewable energy to power their data centers. That means companies and individuals that use cloud platforms of these companies for computing and storage use cleaner energy than they would if they chose to use their local hardware. Most small businesses don’t have the capacity to transition their local computing to using renewable energy. This is mainly because the choice of the energy they use is beyond their circle of influence.
However, these businesses can choose to use clean energy by shifting most of their computing tasks to cloud platforms whose data centers are powered by renewable energy. To make more impact, knowing if the cloud platform you intend to use is powered by renewable energy is important.
Even if you are just hosting a website, choosing a hosting provider that uses renewable energy to power their data centers will benefit the environment. If you are an environmentally conscious website, you can always consider the energy source used by the different platforms before choosing which one to use for your various operations. At times this could mean paying slightly higher subscription fees.
Some of the hosting providers that are embracing the use of clean energy include InMotion, DreamHost, SiteGround, GreenGeeks, iPage, A2 Hosting, and HostPapa. Using any of these platforms over other alternatives that don’t use clean energy is a contribution that you or your business can make towards creating a sustainable environment.
4. More efficient computing
Cloud computing platforms, including AWS, Google Cloud, Microsoft Azure, and IBM Cloud, use cutting-edge computing hardware that is way more efficient than what businesses use if they had to deploy local servers. More efficiency means less energy consumption that, in the end, reduces the carbon emissions produced while generating this energy.
Besides using efficient hardware, the major players in cloud computing also use smart systems to lower the energy consumption of their servers. Reduction in energy consumption results in lower emissions, eventually reducing carbon emissions generated to produce this energy.
One may argue that businesses can use more efficient hardware to create the same impact. This may not necessarily be true because small and medium-sized businesses don’t have the resources to procure the most efficient cutting-edge hardware. It should also be noted that some data centers are made using custom processors designed to be very efficient at specific computing tasks.
Making custom processors is way expensive for ordinary businesses to afford. It is because of these reasons that bigger cloud computing platforms like AWS and Google Cloud are more efficient than the average data centers in the US and the rest of the world. A study by 451 Research has shown that AWS’ infrastructure is 3.6 times more energy efficient than the median of U.S. enterprise data centers surveyed. So, if you want to use more efficient computing hardware, cloud computing is the way to go.
5. Predicting and tracking performance
Cloud computing platforms are able to predict the performance of their data centers before they are even built. This is possible by analyzing the computing hardware to be used and its expected efficiency, considering the heat it will generate. They also use computing fluid dynamic models to design cooling systems that can effectively cool these data center hardware to prevent performance drops that arise from heating. This forward-thinking strategy during design makes it much easier for these cloud computing platforms to develop the most efficient designs that don’t waste a lot of energy. In the end, this lowers the overall energy consumption, which is a net positive for the environment.
6. Enables businesses to monitor their carbon footprint
Most major cloud computing platforms, including AWS and Azure, have a built-in carbon emission calculator that allows users to see the carbon footprint for their different computing tasks. With these calculators, you can literally monitor your emissions in real time. When users know the impact of their activities on the environment, they tend to be more cautious about how they use the computing hardware at their disposal.
These tools show simple visualizations to show customers their historical carbon emissions, estimate emissions avoided using cloud computing instead of an on-premises data center, and review forecasted emissions based on their current use. If your business uses a hybrid computing strategy, this data gives you an idea of how much you could lower your carbon footprint if you chose to take all your computing load to the cloud.
Measuring the carbon emissions of your local servers is very complicated since it requires you to create your customer calculator based on the hardware you are using. Companies and individuals can also use this data to set carbon footprint goals. Ultimately having access to your carbon emission data is the first step in your company’s efforts toward lowering emissions generated from your day-to-day computing tasks.
7. Dematerialization
This refers to the replacement of your physical hardware with virtual equivalents. For example, one may choose to stream video games instead of buying a fully specced desktop computer for gaming. Companies can also use virtual machines in the cloud instead of procuring the powerful computing hardware they need to run some of their software.
The two main benefits of dematerialization are lowering the need to buy expensive hardware and lowering energy consumption during use. This results in lower carbon emissions at the point of production for the computing hardware. Carbon emissions are also reduced as a result of the lowered computing needs.
8. Data centers are close to energy sources.
Data centers for the major tech companies, including Amazon, Google, and Facebook, are located close to the energy source. Some energy sources are built by the company that owns the data center. For example, several Google data centers powered by hybrid (solar and wind) plants are constructed and owned by Google.
This reduces the need to build sophisticated grid networks to transport the megawatts of power that these data centers need. Eliminating these sophisticated grid systems is a net positive for the environment since it saves the materials and energy used to build these networks. On the hand, on-premises servers are usually powered by energy from the grid.
Most of this energy is transmitted from sources that are several miles away from the real consumers. In the USA, over 5% of the energy transmitted and distributed in the US is lost before it gets to the final users. Overall, there is a huge environmental benefit to constructing data centers close to the energy source.
Your Role as the Final Consumer
The benefits of cloud computing that we have just discussed can only be achieved if the potential consumers of the various cloud services play their role. In this section of the article, I will take you through some of the roles the final consumer can play to ensure the above benefits are achieved.
Know the energy source of your service provider
When choosing which cloud services to use, always take time to determine the source of energy that powers their computing hardware. You should always prioritize services that use clean energy if at all they can offer you the service you need within your budget. Of course, researching your service provider’s energy sources will take a couple of minutes.
However, those minutes are worth it if you are someone who cares about climate change and environmental sustainability. Remember, using a cloud provider that uses clean energy also lowers your annual carbon footprint.
Reduce your reliability on local computing hardware
Besides saving money, we have seen that using cloud servers to perform heavy computation tasks is more energy efficient than local computing. Some of the heavy computation tasks that you may consider taking to the cloud include gaming, compiling large coding projects, weather simulations, and more. Such tasks require relatively powerful computers.
Cloud providers invest billions of dollars in improving the efficiency of their operations. This results in more performance per watt than local servers since most are usually installed without thinking much about optimizing their efficiency.
Use cloud storage
Using cloud storage has several advantages, including the ability to access and share your files everywhere you go. However, it also lowers the amount of local storage you need. Storing files on the cloud also makes us more cautious about storage, hence deleting the files we don’t need.
Upgrade your hardware only when it is necessary
Most of the time, people tend to upgrade hardware just because a newer version is available. However, this is not good for the environment since it leads to more emissions generated at the point of manufacturing this hardware. With cloud computing, most people don’t need cutting-edge hardware to do their work. You can always use cloud computing services to handle the tasks that require more computing than your local machine.
Final thoughts
There are many positives to our environment that cloud computing has over local computing. Most of these benefits are due to the fact that all the major players in the cloud computing space are shifting to zero emissions in all their operations. So, using their computing services instead of on-premise servers will significantly lower the carbon footprint of your computing operations.
