GreenTouch Consortium and GeSI sign MOU
Collaboration will enable two leading organizations to realize dramatic goals even faster: energy efficient and sustainable global ICT networks
AMSTERDAM - Nov. 14, 2011 - The GreenTouch™ Consortium, a global research initiative dedicated to dramatically improving the energy efficiency of information and communications technology (ICT) networks by a factor of 1,000, and the Global e-Sustainability Initiative (GeSI), an international strategic partnership committed to creating and promoting technologies and practices that foster economic, environmental, and social sustainability, today announced the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU).
In the MoU, the two groups agree to collaborate on understanding the pathways available to the ICT sector to generate energy and emission reductions through the development of appropriate ICT services and technologies, and their deployment in their own and other sectors. This collaboration will be carried out according to a joint plan that will align the two groups' actions and define the issues, scope, aims, resources and timeframe of their cooperation. Development of this plan will be the first step in the collaborative effort.
GT and GeSI are committed to leveraging the strengths and expertise of their respective members in a concerted effort to drive research and investment into energy efficient technologies and solutions. Their common goal is to raise additional awareness of the challenges stemming from climate change, exploding traffic growth, and to couple the developed technology roadmaps to policies and regulations. What is key to this MoU is that by bringing GeSI and GreenTouch together, the consortium can not only increase the technology benefits of energy efficiency, but can bring those benefits into the policy environment, as well.
"I am pleased that GreenTouch and GeSI have taken this first step on working together toward our shared goals and objectives of developing and promoting more efficient ICT products and practices," said GreenTouch Chairman Gee Rittenhouse. “This agreement furthers the commitment by both GeSI and GreenTouch to speed advances in green ICT policies and technologies in order to reach our common goals."
“The ICT industry plays a key role in addressing climate change globally and facilitating efficient and low-carbon development," stated GeSI Chairman Luis Neves. “Partnering with GreenTouch will move GeSI one step forward in reducing the time it takes for innovative ICT solutions for climate change to hit the market," he added.
About GeSI (Global e-Sustainability Initiative)
The Global e-Sustainability Initiative (GeSI) is an international strategic partnership of the Information Communications Technology (ICT) sector and organisations committed to creating and promoting technologies and practices that foster economic, environmental and social sustainability. Formed in 2001, GeSI's vision is a sustainable world through responsible, ICT-enabled transformation. GeSI fosters global and open cooperation, informs the public of its members' voluntary actions to improve their sustainability performance, and promotes technologies that foster sustainable development. GeSI has 33 members representing leading companies and associations from the ICT sector. GeSI also partners with two UN organizations -- the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) and the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) -- as well as a range of international stakeholders committed to ICT sustainability objectives. These partnerships help shape GeSI's global vision regarding the evolution of the ICT sector and how it can best meet the challenges of sustainable development.
About GreenTouch
GreenTouch is a global consortium of leading service providers, academic and industrial research institutions and non-governmental organizations working together to define the challenges, identify the trends and issues and develop solutions that will achieve the goal of delivering within five years the architecture, specifications, roadmap and demonstrations of key components needed to increase the energy efficiency of ICT networks - in particular, the service provider networks that make up the Internet - by a factor of 1,000 from current levels.
In June 2010, GreenTouch received an award for energy efficiency innovation at the Global Telecoms Business Innovation Awards event. For more information, go to greentouch.org.
GreenTouch and the GreenTouch logo are trademarks of Stichting GreenTouch.
Contact:
GreenTouch: Kay Seo
+1 917-288-0803
Kay.Seo@alcatel-lucent.com
GeSI: Alice Valvodova
Tel +32 2 282 8442
alice.valvodova@gesi.org
