Can Cloud Computing Help Your Business Save Money on Electric Bills?
Was your dad the type who strode through the house ordering all in his path to: “Close the lights! Shut the air-conditioning! Shut the TV!” and overall ran a home that resembled the prehistoric ages?
Well, even if your dad was pumped that his electricity bill at the end of each month was in the single digits, you can’t be expected to follow in his footsteps and run your business that way. That will have all of your employees scurrying in a jiffy…to work for someone a little more energy tolerant.
But there are many shortcuts for saving electricity costs at work without having your employees peering in the dark and dripping with sweat. Cloud computing wins the prize for being a tremendous energy saver in the office. With many businesses annual electricity bills soaring into the tens of thousands of dollars, significant savings are, well, significant.
Let’s explore two different ways cloud computing can save business owners oodles of cash.
1) Switching from onsite to offsite server: Traditionally, small businesses had their own server, networking all of the company’s computers. The server’s strength and capacity was dependent on how many computers were linked to it. A larger scale office, with dozens or hundreds of computers, would require many servers, all working nearly non-stop.
Now servers may be efficient, but they have a monstrous appetite for gobbling megawatts of energy. Energy is needed to supply the networked computers with all of the information that they need to obtain from the “mother” computer, the server. In addition, much energy is expended ensuring proper heating and cooling of each server’s components.
However, if your business outsources all or most of your backups and networks to an offsite server, you will completely eliminate the need of having your own, onsite network. This will save tons of energy as private onsite servers are many times idle, yet have to be running in case of need, needlessly gobbling up power. If your business’ server is moved offsite, you and your employees can be accessing it 24/7, with no additional charge to your low monthly fee subscription. If you do the math, you will be amazed how much you will end up saving in power costs this way.
2) Employees that telecommute: When a business has its network all cloud-based offsite, many advantages come into play, with one of them: energy savings costs. It suddenly becomes unnecessary to hire as many employees onsite. Many employees can now work from home as they can access the company’s network and files through the cloud. This enables them to work efficiently-in their own home, running their lights, their coffee machine, their air-conditioning-you get the picture? Just hope, for their sakes, that they don’t live with their energy-police dad anymore. But hey, family fights? Not your problem. They can’t sue you for that one.
For most business owners today who have not yet switched over to cloud-based servers, the question is not: “Will they switch?” But “When will they switch?”
In the meantime, as energy costs continue to rise, the answer will likely be sooner rather than later.
