Industry news

Govt plans IT review

The government has unveiled plans to partake in a full review of how its IT infrastructure impacts the environment.

In the first such review of its kind in the world, the Cabinet Office hopes by drafting measures such as switching off computers when they are not being used and ensuring servers run efficiently it could help cut the public sector's carbon footprint by 117,500 tonnes every year.

Tom Watson, Cabinet Office minister, said the government aims to be the first administration anywhere in the world to formally set out how it will make its ICT systems carbon-neutral by 2020.

"We won't achieve this just by offsetting but by making serious changes to the way we do business," he added.

It was reported earlier in the week by ZDnet.co.uk that the government hopes to decrease its electricity bills and carbon footprint by reducing computers with laptops.

The Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) revealed the scheme, which will allocate one laptop per department worker.