On energy efficiency for enterprise and data center networks

In recent years, there has been intense focus on increasing the energy efficiency of Information Technology (IT) infrastructure. We advocate the need to consider the power consumption holistically over the entire lifetime of these devices. Lifecycle energy considerations include a number of factors, of which operational energy consumption is just one. Of all the IT components, networks have received relatively little attention when it comes to energy efficient operation, and that too focused on the operational power consumption. In this paper, we describe the challenges relating to lifecycle energy management of network devices, present a sustainability analysis of these devices, and develop techniques to significantly reduce the network operational power. A distinguishing feature of our work is that it is applicable to legacy devices, and as such can be deployed now, as opposed to waiting for new standards and products to be developed.

Citation

Mahadevan, P.; Banerjee, S.; Sharma, P.; Shah, A.; Ranganathan, P. On energy efficiency for enterprise and data center networks. IEEE Communications Magazine. 2011 August; 49 (8): 94-100.