Green Grid Officially Launches

The Green Grid, the technology industry consortium focusing on data center efficiency, officially launches today. You could be forgiven if you thought the group was already launched as the initiative was first announced back in April 2006, and has been discussed in numerous media reports in the months since. As part of its official launch, the group published its first three white papers on data center efficiency: The Green Grid Opportunity, Guidelines for Energy Efficient Data Centers and The Green Grid Metrics: Describing Data Center Power Efficiency.

"The collective viewpoint of Green Grid members is that energy efficiency in the data center is the most significant issue facing technology providers and their customers today," the group says in today's press release. "This situation is not only due to exponential increases in power and cooling costs over the past few years, but also because customer demand for concentrated computing is outpacing the availability of clean reliable power in many places around the world."

Will the Green Grid be able to make a difference in the power and cooling issues confronting today's data center operators? The consortium's membership indicates that the computing industry's major players understand the critical nature of energy efficiency in the data center. The consortium's Board of Directors includes AMD, APC, Dell, HP, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, Rackable Systems, SprayCool, Sun Microsystems, and VMware. The inclusion of Intel is significant, as early coverage of the consortium highlighted the visibility of AMD.

In addition to the publication of the white papers, the Green Grid also said it had completed the formation of its membership structure and technical charter.

More than 1,000 people have registered to indicate interest in joining the consortium. According to Information Week, memberships will cost $5,000 for general members and $25,000 for cotnributing members. General members will have access to all technical documentation produced by The Green Grid, access to intellectual property licensing, and opportunities to attend events. Contributing members will have all the above benefits and be eligible to join technology working groups, review technology documentation at each phase of development and directly contribute to shaping future consortium direction.

See additional coverage at The Wall Street Journal, ComputerWorld, InterConnects and The Register, where Ashlee Vance had early word on Intel and Microsoft joining the group.