Intel and HP's PR teams must be happy. CNNMoney picked up on their study that the federal goverment, the nation's largest energy user could save more than $1 bil by greening their data centers.

A few friends have suggested the DoD is seriously evaluating the power consumption of IT systems from desktops, laptops to servers, investigating lower energy consumption as a cost reduction. Given the maturity of the industry, you could imagine there is a new standard based on the amount power required by a worker, and that worker then gets a given system configuration based on the power allowance.

In the past there has been monetary budgets allowed for a given worker. Is it a future of the Green effort that Office workers and business units are given power/electricity allocations? And, these allocations are tracked year to year?

Some Data Centers have started this type of reporting, it is just a matter of time and awareness that power consumption should be reported in real time. The # of PCs and lights left on in the office and servers needlessly running, is one of the biggest opportunities and there are companies like Verdiem, 1E, and Cassatt, making a business to provide this service.