Software To Cut Energy Wastage Could Save Organizations Thousands Each Month

Software designed by the University of Liverpool which automatically shuts down computer systems after usage, is saving large organisations up to £13,000 in electricity costs each month.

The team from Liverpool found that universities with PC centres in 24-hour libraries could be losing more than one million hours of unused computer power each month. Systems experts have developed new software called PowerDown, which works by automatically shutting computers down if left unused for half an hour.

Using the University of Liverpool as a test model the team discovered that 1,600 library-based PC’s alone were using 20,000 kW each week unnecessarily – equating to approximately £2,400 in current electricity prices. PowerDown has so far recovered 24 million hours of PC inactivity within the University.

Lisa Nelson, from the University’s Computing Services Department, who designed the software, said: “PowerDown is simple to install and staff can chose to opt out if, for example, they are running particular software on a machine overnight without a user being logged in. PowerDown is a simple design and has been developed with no cost to the institution.

Read more . . .

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Tags: electricity costs, electricity prices, energy wastage, Innovation, lisa nelson, new software, powerdown, test model

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 15th, 2009 at 9:19 pm and is filed under Innovation, Project Energy. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.