What is being green really mean from the communications infrastructure perspective?
Being green in the context of Comms can be looked at from 3 angles:
- Providing the right communication infrastructure to enable the business to run more effective business practices resulting in lower carbon consumption. Normally this is achieved through changing the way we perform our necessary tasks to maintain and develop business. The common examples of these are home working, conferencing meetings over the web audio/video and collaboration tools.
- Using our communications infrastructure equipment as efficiently as possible in terms of power consumption of servers media gateways and end point devices and maximising lifecycle utilisation. The migration rather than a rip and replace strategy considered as an alternative.
- Minimising e-waste through effective and traceable recycling and disposal, following the EU guidelines. Manufacturer responsibility for WEEE disposal facilitation and adoption of ROHS in manufacture of equipment. All end of life equipment must be disposed of efficiently (with the decline of the second user market option this often means disposal rather than re-use).
All the comms vendors talk green and will automatically push the adoption of unified comms / messaging as green technologies. They are technology enablers yes, but adoption of these technologies and deriving true green benefits invoves a lot of business process and behavioural change commitment from the business. Don't let it be technology led whatever you do! Your service partners need to support you with 'tangible' professional services to help deliver real benefits.
A topic of discussion is the need for Gigabit ethernet on IP Phones - an example of technology led rather than business need? discussion article
Your vendor should be able to show their green credentials in terms of power consumption performance for all their hardware (servers, media gateways and endpoints). They should be able to identify manufacturing standards in compliance with the EU directive for ROHS and also demonstrate policies and procedures to comply with WEEE requirements (for existing users that means a take back policy and authorised agents in place to collect / dispose of materials in a compliant manner.
If you have an existing MD110/TSW infrastructure using the traditional equipment practice it clearly takes up a larger footprint than the equivalent MX-ONE TSE. Aastra offer a solid case for migration to server based/UC rather than rip and replace, although they do offer that option also. Migration gives businesses the ability to manage the change UC brings more effectively. New building options clearly favour a new install approach but existing business policy should recognise migration as a real cost effective option that offers best value for the business, especially given theses current economic times.
Below is an example of how manufacturers present energy efficiency. Please note however, you do need to add the power of the end point infrastructure (floor POE switches, UPS back-up and any local closet air conditioning see the APC paper for further info).
How many phones does your enterprise need? An interesting discussion from VoiceCon talking about a question that is also a green issue Select the video podcast 