76% of executives involved in data center purchases say energy-efficient products have increased as buying priority over last six months

Sun Microsystems, the creator of the Solaris operating system, has announced results from a new study conducted by Harris Interactive and commissioned by Sun, that further validates the growing importance of incorporating energy-efficient products into today's business solutions. In surprising results which measured decisions made over the past six months, while executives recognize energy-efficiency in the datacenter as a buying priority, a majority of survey respondents admit they are not aware of how much their company is spending on energy costs or the amount of green house gas (GHG) emissions they are releasing into the environment.
According to the study which queried 197 executives director level and above in top US companies with annual revenue at $1 billion or more:
76% of respondents noted that energy-efficient products have increased as buying priority, with 23% of that total noting they have increased significantly.
63% of executives are unaware of how much they are spending on energy or GHG emissions. Of those involved in data center purchases, 38% are unaware of these two factors.
61% of respondents say a utility rebate would make them more likely to purchase energy efficient products.
"With over 20% of data center costs now attributed to power and cooling, it's encouraging to see that executives at all levels are looking at ways to address energy efficiency. That being said, more education needs to be done at all levels to clearly understand just how much of an impact companies can make by moving toward green solutions," said Dave Douglas, VP of eco responsibility, Sun Microsystems. "At Sun, we firmly believe 'Eco' stands for both ecology and economics. Through industry initiatives, product development and workplace changes, I'm really proud to say that Sun has taken significant steps to see that our global business strategies are aligned with eco-responsible practices around the world, ultimately enabling cost savings while supporting solutions for the environment."
Sun and PG&E; Promote a "Green" Datacenter
In August of this year, Sun Microsystems announced a first of its kind rebate program with Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E;), one of the largest natural gas and electric utilities in the United States serving 350,000 California businesses. As part of PG&E;'s Non Residential Retrofit program, customers replacing existing equipment with the Sun Fire T1000 and T2000 servers -- which are three to five times more energy efficient than competing systems and take up less space-- can receive a cash savings between $700-$1,000 per server or up to 35 percent when combined with the Sun Upgrade Advantage Program.
The Sun Fire T1000 and T2000 servers optimized for the Solaris 10 Operating System (OS) are based on the UltraSPARC(R) T1 processor with CoolThreads technology, which boast the highest throughput and most eco-responsible processor in its class. Drawing about as much power as a light bulb, its 32 simultaneous processing threads deliver the best performance per watt of any processor available. While conserving energy, these systems do not compromise on performance, setting 13 world records since launch and outperforming competitors systems by up to 5X while using only 20 percent of the power and using only 25 percent of the space.