Despite Widespread Interest, Cost Prohibits Many from Greening IT

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VERNON HILLS, Ill. -- According to a new survey by CDW, just over half of IT decision-makers say cost is the biggest barrier to adopting more environmentally friendly computing practices at work, even though the benefits of doing so are widely recognized.

Fifty-one percent of respondents in the survey said that concerns about cost are the keeping them from going green in their IT departments, even though 80 percent of the business and government leaders surveyed saw the importance of making their IT departments greener.

To query IT decision-makers on the state green IT in their organizations, CDW polled1,041 representatives from businesses of all sizes and federal, state and local government agencies. In addition to gauging high levels of interest in going green, 49 percent of respondents cited positive reputational benefits to their organization as a leading benefit; benefits to the environment and cost savings were the other top draws for implementing green IT operations.

Potentially high costs were far and away the biggest hurdle these IT leaders faced, but other notable responses were concerns about disrupting existing systems, the complexity of implementing green IT programs, as well as a lack of expertise within the organization for undertaking those projects.

Leadership on green IT issues tended to come from the top in the private sector, with 43 percent of respondents saying their CEO, president or owner was the biggest champion on pushing for an environmental IT program. In the public sector, the leaders come more often from the IT department: 38 percent said green initiatives begin with governmental IT managers.

Tellingly, the larger the organization -- both in the private and public sectors -- the more likely they were to have already implemented at least some green IT programs. Sixty-four percent of companies employing more than 1,000 people had already implemented some such programs, with one-quarter saying 50 percent or more of their IT platform consists of green elements, and another 25 percent reaching 25-50 percent of green IT.

Federal government agencies, similarly, scored higher in green IT penetration than smaller agencies: 46 percent of federal agencies were underway, compared to 28 and 38 percent in local and state-level departments.

The survey is a lead-in to a larger report CDW will release next month. The company's 2008 Energy Efficiency IT Report will come out in August and will look more closely at the narrower field of energy use in IT departments. More information about this survey is available online at CDW's IT Monitor website.

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