Green is more than just being cool – it also makes perfect business and social sense

Three weeks ago GreenTouch proudly received an Edison Award for collective disruption. As several people asked and commented on this, I thought now was a good time to reflect on that journey as this was not only a feat of collective disruption but also a great example of environmental leadership, profitable business and social good.

When I was offered to lead the information and communication technology sector’s Bell Labs led GreenTouch initiative mid 2012, it seemed the right thing to do. Leading a consortium of top companies and academics with top talent working on dramatically improving energy efficiency in communication networks was a great challenge. And after all, as my kids said, green is cool. After successfully concluding this initiative, I have to say that this was much more than just being ‘cool’.

It all made a lot of sense: environmental sense, business sense and social sense. The discourse has become a much more rational one.

At its conclusion, GreenTouch showed the world that there is a portfolio of proven technologies, architectures, protocols and algorithms that allow communication networks in 2020 to consume way less energy when compared to the 2010 situation and this whilst supporting a continuous increase in enterprise traffic combined with dramatic growing consumer generated traffic. GreenTouch calculated this to amount to a staggering reduction in energy consumption of 98%. Translated into laymen’s terms this would be equivalent to a reduction of greenhouse gas emissions of 5.8 million cars – think of this as taking 5.8 million cars off the road! But it is more than ‘just’ reducing green house gases.

There is also the business aspect of it. According to GreenTouch, supporting dramatic traffic increases with less energy (electricity) to fuel communication networks will considerably reduce the energy bills of communication service providers and their overall operational expenditure. This will also allow them to create more value elsewhere such as offering their customers more services.

Making communication network equipment more energy efficient, also makes the use of renewable energy sources more realistic. Today, several developing countries have to rely heavily on diesel generators to fuel their communication networks due to a lack of an energy grid. With the advent of more energy efficient equipment, mobile antennae towers can be powered through realistically sized solar panels or wind turbines. Once you have these energy autonomous cell towers you can more easily deploy a communication infrastructure independent of an electricity grid. Think about it, this allows to connecting the next billion people. Now that benefit to society, that really makes a true difference.

And finally, I want to stress that being able to work on an activity that makes business, environmental and social sense was a huge motivating factor for all involved: from the researchers, to the members of the board, the leadership and up to all the stakeholders. Nothing could beat that sense of ownership and purpose!