Idle computing costs UK firms £300 million a year

The bad news: organisations in the UK are wasting as much as £300 million a year by keeping idle computers switched on at night, according to a report conducted by Harris Interactive®  on behalf of 1E and the Alliance to Save Energy.

The good news: British organisations are much better at conserving computer energy than are their counterparts in the US.

Concerns about the environment inspire 27 percent of UK workers to power down their computers at the end of the workday, according to the report. In the US, only 10 percent cited such concerns.

If all the 17 million computer-using workers in the UK would power down at night, they could reduce the nation’s yearly carbon dioxide emissions by about 1.3 million tonnes — about as much as is produced by 245,000 cars.

More than the environment could benefit, too: a UK business with 10,000 computers could save £168,000 a year and cut carbon emissions by 828 tonnes simply by workers turning off all computers at night.

“Employers today have a golden opportunity to demonstrate their environmental and financial leadership by taking a few simple, energy-saving measures, like setting up processes to power down PCs,” said Sumir Karayi, chief executive officer of 1E. “A computer uses energy even when it appears to be idle. Shutting down PCs when not in use will help businesses to significantly reduce costs while preventing tons of CO2 from being emitted into our atmosphere.”