Little Miss Enviro Geek : LMEG

Some personal news...

biwirth — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 03:24:00 GMT

Hello Dear Blog Readers,

(hmmm....that kinda sounds like the beginning of one of those SPAM emails)

I wanted to let you all know I am moving on from Microsoft and shall no longer be blogging here. I'll be moving an archive of these posts to my website http://www.greenitstrategy.com and shall continue blogging there on Green IT.

So what will I be doing now?

Well, I have decided to take some time off, write a book and maybe look into starting my own business. Regardless, you can always catch me through my website and please do feel free to visit me there.

Thank you to everyone who contacted me with their Green IT questions over the past two years and gave me feedback. I really appreciate your support and good luck with your own Green IT initiatives.

Kind Regards,

Bianca AKA Little Miss Enviro Geek

Announcement: Green IT session @ TechEd Australia

biwirth — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 06:38:00 GMT

If you are attending TechEd Australia this year, come in and see my session on “Understanding Environmental Sustainability with Microsoft”

The session will be on 3^rd September from 10:15-11:45am.

Brief Description: Ever wanted to know where Microsoft stands on the whole "Green IT" topic? Attend this broad technology session to understand how Microsoft perceives Green IT & what Microsoft technologies techies can use to 'become greener'. Bianca will cover both general and specific actions you can take and illustrate with examples in use by Microsoft today, both at Tech.Ed and in everyday use.

I'll be covering topics ranging such as Windows Server 2008, HyperV & Vista Power Management, using SCCM 2007 to configure power savings, thin versus thick, data centre efficiency and what Microsoft does in this space.

I’d love to meet you and have a chat around your initiatives in this space... J

My take on TechNet Article: "10 keys to becoming an environmental leader"

biwirth — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 05:10:00 GMT

There has been a great TechNet article posted by Michael Walsh and Eliza Walsh on the top 10 focus areas to becoming a leader on environment and sustainability issues. Below is an overview of my perspective on their focus areas...

#1 - Be familiar with environmental issues and #10 - Remain Current. There are any number of great publications you can subscribe to, and lots of different events and courses you could attend and they are increasing all the time. There are plenty of places you can look including energy standards websites, environmental group websites, "Green IT" news websites, Corporate Management Associations etc etc. On my website, I usually post a number of these events and links to great websites if they are relevant to environmentally sustainable IT issues.

#2 - Objectively assess your company. As well as the suggestions from Michael and Eliza, you may want to engage a professional environment consulting business, who is well aware of the environmental standards businesses should perform to. There are international standards as well which you can baseline against, both from a pure business environmental perspective (e.g. ISO14001 – Environmental Management Systems) or from an Environmentally Sustainable IT perspective (e.g. The Green Grid develops metrics for baselining your data centre power usage).

#3 - Envision where you want to be and when and # 4 - Develop a vision and strategy. One of the areas that is lightly touched on in this section of the article is the importance of feedback. However for a business’ environmental strategy I would strongly recommend more than just feedback after a strategy has been laid out. Involving your employees directly in both planning and execution is crucial to their acceptance of any potential changes. As an example, when Microsoft Australia embarked on their environmental program, they set in place a leadership team who became the core sponsors, including the Microsoft Australia GM, Tracey Fellows. Then they called for anyone willing to put their hand up to become part of the various action teams. These teams would be brainstorming ideas and developing the high level strategy and action plans. And this approach meant people across our business, from many different departments, were directly influencing the program’s goals and outcomes. Our Environment and Sustainability Director was put in charge of all the teams and she and the executive sponsor team assigned team leaders, from the volunteer pool. The team leaders then ran sessions over the course of the program to gather, summarise and present the strategy back to the executive sponsor team. It was an approach that worked really well and generated fantastic discussion and many different but valuable views on our environmental strategy.

#5 – Evangelise the business imperative. Having setup these great teams of passionate and knowledgeable people, Microsoft Australia not only had 1 person evangelising environmental responsibility, but whole teams of people distributed throughout the company. As the saying goes, two heads are better than one. The environmental evangelism continues at MS Australia.

#6 – Manage your messaging. I think Microsoft may sometimes be perceived as not doing as much in the environmental space as some of the other technology companies. I know that’s what I thought when I first joined MS last year. And I was pleasantly surprised to find we do a tonne of stuff that never gets recognised – like how MCS recently developed a crucial environmental management application for one of our government customers. They used Microsoft Dynamics CRM to provide a single customer view and Microsoft SQL Server to provide comprehensive reporting. And the impressive user interface and service oriented architecture was built on the newest .NET technologies of the Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) and Windows Workflow Foundation (WWF). I think those quiet achievements are sometimes so much better than the ones shouted from the rooftops. J

#7 – Enable management through measurement and #8 – Analyze and report environment impact. If there is something that Microsoft technologies can enable then it’s this. I personally think this is one of the best areas where technology can play a role to environmental sustainability. Rock on reporting! One of the coolest solutions I have seen in this space from Microsoft is our Dynamics Environment Dashboard.

#9 – Be a thought leader. The best thing I could recommend here is to look at Michael and Eliza’s roles and think about which one you want to be. Then get out there and talk to people, join groups, volunteer your time with environmental organisations, RSS everything on “Green IT” and write your own stuff. Since I first got involved in environmental science two of the best things I have done were to develop my own website and become an advisory board member for a non-profit organisation. They both push me to keep learning new things and help me consolidate my knowledge about how IT and the environment can work better together. I can’t know everything and neither can you, but reading and writing about the environment and technology will help you develop your own theories and standards on what works and what doesn’t for your company.

Green IT Video: Interview with Microsoft IT Manager Australia

biwirth — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 03:25:31 GMT

In May I interviewed Jonathan Lewis, Microsoft Field IT Manager in Australia on his views of Environmentally Sustainable IT and what Microsoft Australia is doing in this space.

LMEG interviews Jonathan Lewis, Field IT Manager, Microsoft Australia, May 2008

New Windows Server 2008 Power Savings Whitepaper & results published!!!

biwirth — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 02:18:00 GMT

Microsoft has published a new whitepaper on Windows Server 2008 power savings, and the results and methodologies of the tests run to develop the paper.

This is an excellent document, which outlines the test results (downloadable in separate spreadsheets) and the role of virtualisation in optimising energy efficiencies in your data centres.

Check it out at: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=61d493fd-855d-4719-8662-3a40ba3a0a5c&displaylang=en

TechNet: Less runs more with Windows Server 2008

biwirth — Thu, 08 May 2008 01:31:00 GMT

Today on the Microsoft TechNet Australia newsletter, I wrote the editorial with some info around environmentally sustainable IT solutions using Windows Server 2008, SharePoint and Windows Mobile...copied here for those of you who missed out...

"Hi All,

This month Microsoft has let a enviro geek chick into the editorial ranks! And, as such, I just couldn't resist jumping onto the Windows Server 2008 Unleashed site to check out our Windows 2008 pet robot, IT 24-7.

After clicking on Toy Box, I was delighted to find a range of goodies like screensavers of my new friend. And I was also impressed by the wide range of more serious info - case studies and features on manageability, web and stability. All in all, with Windows Server 2008, less can definitely run more.

Power saving and virtualisation are two features I'm really excited about. And if you've been asked by your managers to investigate 'green' or environmentally sustainable IT solutions, you'll be excited about them too! The Virtualisation ROI tool determines power and cooling savings. So you can get that dream Windows 2008 Hyper-V environment, save business dollars, and reduce carbon emissions - all at the same time.

I must admit, I do have two other favourites - Windows Mobile and Microsoft Office SharePoint. I love anything that allows me to work out of the office and, even better, save time and the environment by not driving to work. You can learn all about these great tools on a new website called Gear up. What's more, check out the new Windows Mobile Business Value Calculator which will come in handy when you're building your 'work-out-of-office' business case.

Also check out this useful article about Sustainable Computing from our recent TechNet magazine. It's worth a read!"