Tha debate of Internet v/s Environment

avatar

The development vs. environment debate has also engulfed the internet. Not only are industrial and traffic pollution adversely impacting the environment, but the recent reports have seen some adverse effects due to unnecessary electricity used in the Internet. Net surfers sitting around the world want to get the information they want on one command, but how much extra effort the servers have to make in that process is also a matter of study.



Source

Dr. Alex Wiesner-Gross, a renowned physicist at Harvard University, concluded from his study a while back that searching twice on Google produces almost the same amount of carbon dioxide as boiling a cup of tea. Boiling one cup of tea produces about 15 grams of carbon dioxide. The news was so sensational and worrying that Google had to issue a statement and 'clear the situation' about it.

However, Google had to admit that even though its discovery does not produce that much carbon dioxide, it certainly does and it has some contribution to raise the world's temperature. He compared it to Dr. Visner-Gross's estimation (7 grams per search) as 0.2 grams. But what Google did not say was that such pollution is generated only by those searches, which results very easily. Carbon dioxide produced from complex searches (which require a lot of effort from Google's technical system) can range anywhere from one gram to ten grams.

And listen. In 2007, German Internet company Strato counted Google's data centers, servers and search requests, claiming that electricity spent on a Google search could burn an 11 watt CFL bulb for up to an hour! Today, while some two billion people are connected to the Internet in some form or the other, it is not difficult to estimate the worldwide energy consumption. And above that it is growing at a rate of ten percent every year! This means that by the time you and us get up using the internet for a few hours, we have contributed a little more to the world's most worrying problem.


image.png
Source


We have made the challenge of global warming a little more serious, although we do not realize it at all. And why blame any one company for this? From the hefty videos of YouTube to the virtual online world of Second Life, and from the technologies of telegens to the mass downloading music, no one is behind. The web-based email services that we use, the Internet-based VoIP-based communications services we are encouraged to use are all increasing our environmental complexity - by increasing energy consumption, temperature heat and the amount of harmful gases.

Would you believe that the amount of carbon dioxide produced by airplanes, helicopters and all other mediums associated with the aviation industry is less than the carbon dioxide produced by the Internet! According to the American research firm Gartner, in 2007, the Internet overtook the air travel industry with two percent contribution to global pollution. It is not that we should reduce the use of technology or shut down the computer. There is a need to be aware of this.

Ensuring that there is no unnecessary addition or misuse of our computers and the Internet, it is important not only to save our electricity and internet bills but also in terms of global environment.

Why is google on target

Google, one of the world's largest Internet companies, is particularly targeted for damaging the environment, due to its huge and numerous data centers, with a large number of servers day and night meeting the demands of net-surfers around the world. Are busy doing it All the companies that run large internet-based projects, web hosting companies etc. have their own data centers which have thousands of servers. Their microprocessors consume large amounts of electricity and generate heat in the atmosphere.



Source


A large number of air conditioners are used to suppress this heat. These keep the interior of the data centers cool, but also flow large quantities of hot gases out of the earth's atmosphere. Even gases used in air conditioners, called greenhouse gases, damage the ozone layer protecting the earth. In these, fuels like coal, gas etc. are used to produce electricity which again increases global warming.
Would you believe that in the US data centers alone, around 61 billion kWh of electricity was spent in 2006. With this much electricity, the whole of England can be kept illuminated for two months. This figure is from Lawrence Berkeley National Lab of California.

Today, the situation has become more severe than in 2006. It was a matter of America alone. How much energy will data centers around the world be drinking? Along with them, try adding research and development centers of these companies and now cloud computing servers as well. It is said that in its own headquarters of Google (Google Complex), electricity costs equivalent to 3,333 households in California.

Our share in global warming starts at the same time when we turn on our computer. In active state our own computer consumes about 175 watts of power. After that, our personal computer networks, broadband networks, Internet gateways of various countries and finally the respective website servers are all consuming electricity.

The funny thing is that the internet search that we do does not significantly increase the power consumption in our own computer, but when that command goes to a server in a data center of another continent thousands of kilometers away, its microprocessor must be Hard work is required to answer and power is consumed in this process. The more labor (calculations) it has to do, the more the consumption of electricity and consequently the heat of the surrounding environment.

Dr. Visioner Gross estimates that in looking at a general website, we give rise to about twenty milligrams of carbon dioxide per second at different levels.



Source

If the website contains video, music, animation etc. then this figure can be up to 300 milligrams per second. If a search on Google costs 11 watts of electricity, imagine how much more Google's energy needs will be given on an average of 200 million search results per day! Google does not reveal its data on this, but its technology is such that it increases energy consumption. Google has built data centers in places like America, China, Japan, Europe etc. and when we try to search for a keyword, its command is sent to multiple servers, not to one server.

To answer fast, there is a competition among them and the answer comes first, Google shows us the same. Obviously, the energy wasted on all the other servers was unnecessary! But the ability to produce search results in a few milli-seconds is the basis of Google's success, which has made it the world's successful Internet company. Will he be willing to sacrifice it for the environment?

The debate of development versus environment and business versus environment is also relevant in the Internet world. How ironic that the speed at which the capacity of the Internet and the number of 'connected' people is increasing, the burden on the environment increases with the same proportion.


Thanks for a visit. @zumed



0
0
0.000
3 comments