How power-hungry is the “cloud”?
The internet is abuzz with the results from a report by a Harvard physicist showing that a typical Google search generates ~7 grams of carbon dioxide (something the search giant disputes). But the fact that Google owns data centers full of servers that consume electricity, and consequently contribute to greenhouse gas emissions, shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone.
However, the increasing focus on “cloud” computing and its reliance on such server farms raises an important question - how will expanded server-based computing affect overall power consumption?
