Research Findings Local Government Procurement, Management and ...
Research Findings Local Government Procurement, Management and Use of Office IT and Equipment
October 2008.
Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
This publication is copyright. Reproduction requires the written permission of the Department of the Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts. Support for this project was made available through the Australian Government’s Local Greenhouse Action initiative. Cities for Climate Protection (CCP) Australia: implementing greenhouse action through a collaboration between the Australian Government and ICLEI Oceania. The CCP Australia program is funded by the Australian Government. ICLEI Oceania is the regional secretariat for ICLEI – Local Governments for Sustainability, which was founded in 1990 as the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives. ICLEI Oceania is legally represented by the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives – Australia/New Zealand Limited. Cities for Climate Protection, CCP and the CCP logo are all registered trademarks of the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives – Australia/New Zealand Limited. The views and opinions expressed in this document do not necessarily reflect those of the Australian Government, the Department of the Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts or the international organisation, ICLEI – Local Governments for Sustainability. Neither ICLEI Oceania nor the Australian Government accept liability in respect to any information or advice given in relation to, or as a consequence of, anything contained herein. For further information about the Cities for Climate Protection Campaign in Australia please contact: ICLEI Oceania Level 4, 267 Collins Street Melbourne VIC 3000 Australia Phone: +61 (0) 39639 8688 Fax: +61 (0) 3639 8677 Email: [email protected]
www.iclei.org/ccp-au
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
Contents 1 2 3 4
5 6 7
Introduction ..................................................................................................................... 4 Key Findings ................................................................................................................... 4 Methodology ................................................................................................................... 5 Results............................................................................................................................ 6 4.1 Procurement Procedures ...................................................................................... 6 4.2 Power Management Enablement .......................................................................... 8 4.3 User Behaviour ..................................................................................................... 9 4.4 Server Virtualisation ............................................................................................ 10 4.5 Thin Client Terminals .......................................................................................... 10 4.6 Opportunities for Consolidating Stock ................................................................. 11 4.7 End-of-Life Disposal............................................................................................ 11 Conclusion .................................................................................................................... 12 References.................................................................................................................... 13 Appendix A: Survey Questions...................................................................................... 14
Table of Figures Figure 1- Stage 2 Survey Respondents by State Figure 2- Frequency of Replacement Figure 3- Reason for Replacement: Computers Figure 4- Annual Spend on Office and IT Equipment Figure 5- Usual Procurement Procedures Figure 6- Sustainability Criteria Included in Quotes Figure 7- Power Management Enabled: Computers Figure 8- Staff Turn Off Desktop Equipment Figure 9- Staff Turn Off Communal Equipment Figure 10- Does Council Have Virtualised Servers Figure 11- Does Council Have Thin Client Terminals Figure 12- Number of Staff That Share a Printer Figure 13- Barriers to Sharing a Printer Figure 14- Disposal Pathways for Local Government Office and IT Equipment
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
1
Introduction
Australian local governments depend on reliable information technology (IT) and office equipment to perform their core business functions and provide essential support to their local communities. However, little is known about how local governments procure, manage and use office and IT equipment, or to what extent Australian councils consider energy efficiency and other sustainability criteria in their IT decision-making. IT and office equipment is known to contribute around 2% of all global greenhouse gas emissions each year, equivalent to that of the entire aviation sector (Gartner, 2007). Local governments have a clear opportunity and challenge to minimise these emissions to mitigate human-induced climate change and concurrently minimise the impact of rising energy costs. ICLEI Oceania, with support from the Department of Environment, Heritage, Water and the Arts, has developed the Switch IT Over Project – an energy reduction initiative to assist local government’s reduce the greenhouse gas emissions associated with the use of office and IT equipment. As an early deliverable of the Switch IT Over Project, this report details research findings on the current practice and approaches to local government procurement, power management and use of office and IT equipment.. These findings inform the Switch IT Over project implementation and enable Australian councils themselves to benchmark their situation against national averages.
2
Key Findings
The detailed findings of the survey are outlined later in this report. The following points are a summary of the key findings: ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !
A majority of councils surveyed replace their desktop computers, laptops, monitors and servers about every 3 years. Similarly, a majority of surveyed councils replace their copiers, printers and faxes every 5 years. There is a low awareness amongst Information Services (IS) Managers as to the energy consumed by office and IT equipment within council. Many councils that choose suppliers off the state negotiated contract assume that the state procurement body has assessed suppliers against comprehensive environmental criteria— this may not be the case. Power management settings (e.g. ENERGY STAR!) are enabled on most equipment, however some councils have problems with staff disabling them. Council staff are generally consistent at turning off their personal desktop equipment, however are inconsistent at turning off communal items such as printers. A majority of councils have already implemented server virtualisation projects or intend to in the next 12 months. Thin client terminals are used by just over a third of surveyed councils, however in some of these cases implementation is restricted to the council library or remote offices. Generally there is a small printer to staff ratio (i.e. 10-20 staff per printer), with internal obstacles such as staff unwilling to walk further to collect print jobs and confidentiality as the biggest barriers to councils consolidating their printer fleets. Only a small percentage of councils have take-back and recycle arrangements with suppliers or are prepared to pay a fee for a contractor to recycle old equipment.
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
3
Methodology
The research was undertaken in two stages. Stage one was undertaken between June and July 2008, and involved nine semi-structured interviews with IS Managers from the following Cities for Climate Protection (CCP) councils: ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !
City of Yarra (VIC) Corangamite Shire Council (VIC) Kogarah Council (NSW) Bankstown City Council (NSW) Clare & Gilbert Valleys Council (SA) City of Subiaco (WA) City of Wanneroo (WA) City of Nedlands (WA) Shire of Augusta-Margaret River (WA)
The stage one phone interviews allowed a testing of assumptions about current practice and to better account for the variation in practice between state, size and locality of councils. No CCP councils from Queensland, Tasmania or Canberra were prepared to participate in the phone interview (the Northern Territory was omitted). Stage one informed the survey questions and focus of stage two. Stage two was undertaken between August and September 2008 and involved administering a quantitative, online survey targeted at 232 CCP IS Managers. Where direct contact details for council IS Managers could not be obtained, an email was sent to councils general administration email account, addressed to the IS Manager. The survey was also promoted through several Local Government Association newsletters, and the online CCP Bulletin newsletter. Out of 232 CCP councils, a total of 97 councils completed the survey, a response rate of 42%. Of these respondents, a majority were from eastern states of New South Wales (41%) and Victoria (27%).
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
4
Results
The survey was designed to investigate several different aspects of office and IT equipment procurement, management and use. The survey findings will be presented according to these themes. 4.1 Procurement Procedures Councils were asked a series of questions about their IT and office equipment procurement practice, including the frequency and primary reasons for replacing stock. Frequency of Replacement It was found that the majority of council replace their equipment every 3-5 years. Computers, monitors, laptops and server equipment are most commonly replaced every 3 years, whereas printers, copiers and faxes tend to be replaced every 5 years. 40% of respondents cited the lease or service agreement as the primary reason for replacing printers and other imaging equipment, which aligns with the timeframes of most lease agreements. For those without lease agreements, equipment tends to be replaced on an asneeded basis (31%). Reason for Replacement Councils cited a number of reasons for the replacement of stock. For example, the most common reason for replacing computers is because of councils IT or management policy (43%). This indicates that in most cases there is scope to change council policy to extend the replacement cycle and prolong the life of equipment. Some councils already extend the life of products, they commented: “ Generally PCs, Notebooks, Monitors & Servers may be replaced when necessary, we use 3-5 years as a guide”. “ Laptops - some replaced on 3 year out of warranty - others by request & business unit funding”. “ Reason for replacement [is] a combination of most criteria (i.e. capacity, performance, warranty expiration, policy) rather than one”. Budget and Energy Use Overall, there was a lack of awareness by IS Managers as to the energy required to operate councils IT and office equipment, with only 3% able to answer the question. This is not a surprising finding. The Green Grid (2008) comments that:
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
“Vendors commonly put inefficient power supplies in high-volume servers because they don’t see a competitive advantage in putting in more efficient components. Since IT typically doesn’t pay the electrical bill, their buyers have shown greater interest in the initial cost of a server than on energy savings over the server’s lifetime”. 58% of survey respondents knew the approximate annual spend on office and IT (excluding consumables). This ranged from $30,000 - $3.7 million per annum, with a majority of respondents spending in the $100,000 - $299,000 range. The combined annual spend of all councils surveyed equalled $35.6 million. This spends extrapolated across the entire local government sector represents a significant market share of electronic equipment sales. Interestingly, 40% of local governments surveyed use suppliers negotiated through a state government contract. This suggests that a relatively small number of vendors receive a large proportion of local government spend on office and IT equipment. This presents an opportunity for local governments to coordinate purchasing requests so that selected vendors only offer products that comply with energy efficiency standards and other sustainability criteria. When asked what sustainability criteria council currently specifies in tenders and contracts, there was a mixed response. Requests for parts and components guarantee (25%), energy saving features (18%), and compatibility with recycled content consumables (18%) were the most common environmental criteria. Requests for equipment that contained minimal hazardous substance (10%), recyclable casing and parts (7%), and suppliers that take back and recycle old equipment (5%) were not as common. A number of councils believe that procuring equipment through the state government negotiated contracts ensures that suppliers meet with stringent sustainability criteria. This may not be the case, therefore it is prudent that council check what environmental and social criteria is included in procurement documentation and assessments to ensure the purchase complies with councils green IT directives.
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
4.2 Power Management Enablement Some office and IT equipment has inbuilt power management capabilities that allow the device to enter a lower power state after a period of inactivity. The most widely used power management standard in Australia is ENERGY STAR!. Power management is a significant energy conservation measure for several types of equipment such as computers, monitors and printers that are switched on for long periods of time (Australian Greenhouse Office and ICLEI, 2005). Councils were asked a series of questions about their power management settings. Just under half (48%) of all councils have power management features enabled on all of their computers. A further 31% responded that only some computers have power management enabled. Power management settings can be disabled by the user, which could account for this figure. Councils commented: “They are set as default by IT but staff can change them”. “Negotiated between IT and department staff to maximise green settings against user needs”. “Moving to set [power management as default] by IT but receiving a lot of resistance. Over 30% will not shutdown computers at night”. “Decision made on recommendation of IT but ignored by many. Little effective backing by upper management”.
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
4.3 User Behaviour Councils were asked if staff turn off their desktop computers at the end of each day. The majority of respondents observed that staff switch off equipment they are personally responsible for always (11%) or nearly always (65%), whereas staff only switch off communally shared equipment (such as printers) 4% of time.
This suggests it is possible to encourage staff through behaviour change and awareness raising campaigns to switch off their personal equipment at the end of the workday, yet it may be more effective to use timers on communal equipment. Councils employ a range of measures to encourage staff to use equipment more efficiently: Information Provision “Our Smart Growth department often sends out reminders and has developed promotional information around the offices to encourage people to be more energy efficient with… printers, dual copying…”. “Advertising and information, reminders to turn off…” “Through internal communication processes (internal emails)”. Incentives “Internal environmental action group activities, e.g. ‘frog fairy’ randomly leaves chocolate frogs when people switch off their monitors for the night”. Education and Training “The Council's environmental team actively educate our staff [and] engage managers on environmental measures & considerations”. Campaigns “[Council] recently conducted a Switch IT off campaign to encourage staff to switch computers and monitors off at the end of each day”.
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
4.4 Server Virtualisation Server virtualisation involves reducing the amount of physical servers by using virtualisation software to consolidate the workload from a multitude of under-utilised servers onto fewer, more energy efficient servers (IBM Corporation, 2008). Fewer units mean fewer fans; uninterrupted power supplies, network hardware and cooling requirements and thus savings in energy and greenhouse gas emissions can be achieved. Other benefits of server virtualisation include maintained reliability, increased space in server rooms and improved transferability of data. Given this is a relatively new technology, it was interesting to find that 62% of councils had already implemented some server virtualisation and a further 23% have plans to do so in the next 12 months. Many indicated that they had implemented virtualisation in a test environment prior to a staged full implementation. Given the significant reductions in greenhouse gas emissions that can be achieved with server virtualisation, it is promising to see most councils are adopting this new technology. 4.5
Thin Client Terminals A thin client is a network computer without a hard disk drive and involves replacing desktop computers with scaled back terminals, moving the bulk of the data processing onto the server. This saves a significant amount of operational energy and maximises computing resources. Thin client terminals do not need to be replaced as often as desktop computers, which also minimises resource use.
37% of councils surveyed already have thin client terminals in place, with a further 12% planning to implement a switch over in the next 12 months. This uptake is not as strong as the server virtualisation. However, unlike server virtualisation, thin client technology has been around for a longer period, with some councils indicating they had been using thin clients for over 10 years. Some council’s only use such terminals in libraries and remote offices. One council commented that most staff are unhappy with thin clients. Further research would needs to be done to establish the key barriers to the successful uptake of thin client terminals.
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
4.6 Opportunities for Consolidating Stock Increasingly there are multifunction devices and high-capability printers that can service a greater number of users and enable council to rationalise their units. This can help to reduce the operational energy use and cost of procuring consumables for multiple models of equipment. Councils were asked how many users shared a printer. The majority (43%) of councils have allocated one printer to 11 - 20 users. 36% allocated one printer to 1 - 10 users. This is not a particularly efficient way to operate a printing network, with best practice councils allocating one multifunction document centre for up to 40 users (ICLEI Oceania, 2008). Councils were asked what they thought where the main barriers to staff sharing printers. Apart from practicalities such as staff being spread over multiple locations (16%) and specialist needs for equipment (15%), the most common barriers were staff reluctance to walk further to collect print jobs (26%), and fears over confidentiality (24%). The last two reasons are potentially easy to overcome given appropriate management support for sharing printers, and technological solutions that provide users with individual swipe cards that give the command to specifically process print jobs. These are areas that will be investigated through the Switch IT Over Project. 4.7 End-of-Life Disposal A final area of investigation was to establish the usual end-of-life disposal pathways for old equipment. Given the high frequency of product replacement and toxicity of electronic waste, it is important for councils to dispose of their e-waste through channels that are environmentally and socially responsible. Councils were asked what typically happened to old equipment. As figure 14 demonstrates, there are numerous disposal pathways used by councils. Only 16% are returned to the supplier to be recycled or re-used and a further 8% of councils surveyed are prepared to pay a contractor to recycle old equipment. A small percentage (4%) dispose of their waste to
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
landfill. Studies have shown that 80% of equipment that is stockpiled for spare parts ends up in landfill, as the value of equipment decreases the longer it is stored (Matthews et al, 1997). Equipment that is sold onto staff or the public or donated to community groups essentially transfers the cost and responsibility of disposal onto others, albeit may serve a social benefit. The findings suggest there is considerable opportunitys to improve councils’ end-of-life disposal practice for better environmental outcomes.
5
Conclusion
This study has enabled ICLEI Oceania to fill an information gap in better understanding local government procurement practice and use of office and IT equipment. The findings of this study will underpin the approach employed in the Cities for Climate Protection! Switch IT Over Project. The findings highlight that a majority of councils undertake a regular schedule for product upgrades, indicating the need for a flexible and accessible project methodology that councils can implement when it suits their individual replacement timelines. Further, the research shows that the Switch IT Over Project will provide a much-needed framework and relevant support materials to assist IS departments to identify the energy use from councils office and IT equipment. This will enable council staff to consider the total cost and impact of product ownership, instead of solely up-front cost, in addition to improving energy reporting and greenhouse gas abatement from green IT initiatives. The research findings also illustrate that improving staff use of equipment and adopting stronger power management approaches are an important focus for action through the Switch IT Over Project, with many councils still struggling to ensure staff switch off equipment outside of business hours. The research findings also demonstrate that councils have significant collective procurement power for office and IT equipment, and could make better use of product specifications to require compliance with energy efficiency and other sustainability criteria. Finally, the survey findings suggest there is a need for councils to assess their end-of-life disposal of old equipment to improve environmental outcomes. These areas will be investigated further through the Switch IT Over Project. ICLEI Oceania will collate detailed case studies of councils that implement successful product switch overs that address staff behaviour change, power management and policy updates to ensure long-lasting organisational support for the sustainable procurement, use and end-of-life disposal of office and IT equipment.
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
6
References
Australian Greenhouse Office, ICLEI. (2005). Standby Energy Consumption: Australian Local Government Buildings, (Report 2005/22), Part of the National Appliance and Energy Equipment Efficiency Program, Australian Government. Gartner. (2007). “Gartner Estimates ICT Industry Accounts for 2 Percent of Global CO2 Emissions”, Presentation at Gartner Symposium/IT Expo: Emerging Trends, San Francisco. IBM Corporation. (2008). The green data centre- More than social responsibility: A foundation for growth, economic gain and operating stability, Somers NY. ICLEI Oceania. (2008). Penrith City Council Printer Rationalisation Project: Case Study, interview conducted May, 2008. Matthews, H.S, McMichael, F.C, Hendrickson, C. T and Hart, D.J. (1997). Disposition and End-of-Life Options for Personal Computers, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh. The Green Grid. (2008). The Green Grid Opportunity: Decreasing data centre and other IT energy usage patterns, www.thegreengrid.org [accessed 17/07/08]. Verdiem. (2008). 3 Building Blocks to a Green IT Strategy, [online] www.verdiem.com [accessed 29/09/08].
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
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Appendix A: Survey Questions
To view the entire survey findings, visit: www.surveymonkey.com/sr.aspx?sm=SO9zCkWJ4YgPsX_2b3FDAeH_2fqZ29ytgU_2fYixv1 N55d2Hw_3d
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
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October 2008.
Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
This publication is copyright. Reproduction requires the written permission of the Department of the Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts. Support for this project was made available through the Australian Government’s Local Greenhouse Action initiative. Cities for Climate Protection (CCP) Australia: implementing greenhouse action through a collaboration between the Australian Government and ICLEI Oceania. The CCP Australia program is funded by the Australian Government. ICLEI Oceania is the regional secretariat for ICLEI – Local Governments for Sustainability, which was founded in 1990 as the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives. ICLEI Oceania is legally represented by the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives – Australia/New Zealand Limited. Cities for Climate Protection, CCP and the CCP logo are all registered trademarks of the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives – Australia/New Zealand Limited. The views and opinions expressed in this document do not necessarily reflect those of the Australian Government, the Department of the Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts or the international organisation, ICLEI – Local Governments for Sustainability. Neither ICLEI Oceania nor the Australian Government accept liability in respect to any information or advice given in relation to, or as a consequence of, anything contained herein. For further information about the Cities for Climate Protection Campaign in Australia please contact: ICLEI Oceania Level 4, 267 Collins Street Melbourne VIC 3000 Australia Phone: +61 (0) 39639 8688 Fax: +61 (0) 3639 8677 Email: [email protected]
www.iclei.org/ccp-au
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
Contents 1 2 3 4
5 6 7
Introduction ..................................................................................................................... 4 Key Findings ................................................................................................................... 4 Methodology ................................................................................................................... 5 Results............................................................................................................................ 6 4.1 Procurement Procedures ...................................................................................... 6 4.2 Power Management Enablement .......................................................................... 8 4.3 User Behaviour ..................................................................................................... 9 4.4 Server Virtualisation ............................................................................................ 10 4.5 Thin Client Terminals .......................................................................................... 10 4.6 Opportunities for Consolidating Stock ................................................................. 11 4.7 End-of-Life Disposal............................................................................................ 11 Conclusion .................................................................................................................... 12 References.................................................................................................................... 13 Appendix A: Survey Questions...................................................................................... 14
Table of Figures Figure 1- Stage 2 Survey Respondents by State Figure 2- Frequency of Replacement Figure 3- Reason for Replacement: Computers Figure 4- Annual Spend on Office and IT Equipment Figure 5- Usual Procurement Procedures Figure 6- Sustainability Criteria Included in Quotes Figure 7- Power Management Enabled: Computers Figure 8- Staff Turn Off Desktop Equipment Figure 9- Staff Turn Off Communal Equipment Figure 10- Does Council Have Virtualised Servers Figure 11- Does Council Have Thin Client Terminals Figure 12- Number of Staff That Share a Printer Figure 13- Barriers to Sharing a Printer Figure 14- Disposal Pathways for Local Government Office and IT Equipment
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
1
Introduction
Australian local governments depend on reliable information technology (IT) and office equipment to perform their core business functions and provide essential support to their local communities. However, little is known about how local governments procure, manage and use office and IT equipment, or to what extent Australian councils consider energy efficiency and other sustainability criteria in their IT decision-making. IT and office equipment is known to contribute around 2% of all global greenhouse gas emissions each year, equivalent to that of the entire aviation sector (Gartner, 2007). Local governments have a clear opportunity and challenge to minimise these emissions to mitigate human-induced climate change and concurrently minimise the impact of rising energy costs. ICLEI Oceania, with support from the Department of Environment, Heritage, Water and the Arts, has developed the Switch IT Over Project – an energy reduction initiative to assist local government’s reduce the greenhouse gas emissions associated with the use of office and IT equipment. As an early deliverable of the Switch IT Over Project, this report details research findings on the current practice and approaches to local government procurement, power management and use of office and IT equipment.. These findings inform the Switch IT Over project implementation and enable Australian councils themselves to benchmark their situation against national averages.
2
Key Findings
The detailed findings of the survey are outlined later in this report. The following points are a summary of the key findings: ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !
A majority of councils surveyed replace their desktop computers, laptops, monitors and servers about every 3 years. Similarly, a majority of surveyed councils replace their copiers, printers and faxes every 5 years. There is a low awareness amongst Information Services (IS) Managers as to the energy consumed by office and IT equipment within council. Many councils that choose suppliers off the state negotiated contract assume that the state procurement body has assessed suppliers against comprehensive environmental criteria— this may not be the case. Power management settings (e.g. ENERGY STAR!) are enabled on most equipment, however some councils have problems with staff disabling them. Council staff are generally consistent at turning off their personal desktop equipment, however are inconsistent at turning off communal items such as printers. A majority of councils have already implemented server virtualisation projects or intend to in the next 12 months. Thin client terminals are used by just over a third of surveyed councils, however in some of these cases implementation is restricted to the council library or remote offices. Generally there is a small printer to staff ratio (i.e. 10-20 staff per printer), with internal obstacles such as staff unwilling to walk further to collect print jobs and confidentiality as the biggest barriers to councils consolidating their printer fleets. Only a small percentage of councils have take-back and recycle arrangements with suppliers or are prepared to pay a fee for a contractor to recycle old equipment.
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
3
Methodology
The research was undertaken in two stages. Stage one was undertaken between June and July 2008, and involved nine semi-structured interviews with IS Managers from the following Cities for Climate Protection (CCP) councils: ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !
City of Yarra (VIC) Corangamite Shire Council (VIC) Kogarah Council (NSW) Bankstown City Council (NSW) Clare & Gilbert Valleys Council (SA) City of Subiaco (WA) City of Wanneroo (WA) City of Nedlands (WA) Shire of Augusta-Margaret River (WA)
The stage one phone interviews allowed a testing of assumptions about current practice and to better account for the variation in practice between state, size and locality of councils. No CCP councils from Queensland, Tasmania or Canberra were prepared to participate in the phone interview (the Northern Territory was omitted). Stage one informed the survey questions and focus of stage two. Stage two was undertaken between August and September 2008 and involved administering a quantitative, online survey targeted at 232 CCP IS Managers. Where direct contact details for council IS Managers could not be obtained, an email was sent to councils general administration email account, addressed to the IS Manager. The survey was also promoted through several Local Government Association newsletters, and the online CCP Bulletin newsletter. Out of 232 CCP councils, a total of 97 councils completed the survey, a response rate of 42%. Of these respondents, a majority were from eastern states of New South Wales (41%) and Victoria (27%).
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
4
Results
The survey was designed to investigate several different aspects of office and IT equipment procurement, management and use. The survey findings will be presented according to these themes. 4.1 Procurement Procedures Councils were asked a series of questions about their IT and office equipment procurement practice, including the frequency and primary reasons for replacing stock. Frequency of Replacement It was found that the majority of council replace their equipment every 3-5 years. Computers, monitors, laptops and server equipment are most commonly replaced every 3 years, whereas printers, copiers and faxes tend to be replaced every 5 years. 40% of respondents cited the lease or service agreement as the primary reason for replacing printers and other imaging equipment, which aligns with the timeframes of most lease agreements. For those without lease agreements, equipment tends to be replaced on an asneeded basis (31%). Reason for Replacement Councils cited a number of reasons for the replacement of stock. For example, the most common reason for replacing computers is because of councils IT or management policy (43%). This indicates that in most cases there is scope to change council policy to extend the replacement cycle and prolong the life of equipment. Some councils already extend the life of products, they commented: “ Generally PCs, Notebooks, Monitors & Servers may be replaced when necessary, we use 3-5 years as a guide”. “ Laptops - some replaced on 3 year out of warranty - others by request & business unit funding”. “ Reason for replacement [is] a combination of most criteria (i.e. capacity, performance, warranty expiration, policy) rather than one”. Budget and Energy Use Overall, there was a lack of awareness by IS Managers as to the energy required to operate councils IT and office equipment, with only 3% able to answer the question. This is not a surprising finding. The Green Grid (2008) comments that:
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
“Vendors commonly put inefficient power supplies in high-volume servers because they don’t see a competitive advantage in putting in more efficient components. Since IT typically doesn’t pay the electrical bill, their buyers have shown greater interest in the initial cost of a server than on energy savings over the server’s lifetime”. 58% of survey respondents knew the approximate annual spend on office and IT (excluding consumables). This ranged from $30,000 - $3.7 million per annum, with a majority of respondents spending in the $100,000 - $299,000 range. The combined annual spend of all councils surveyed equalled $35.6 million. This spends extrapolated across the entire local government sector represents a significant market share of electronic equipment sales. Interestingly, 40% of local governments surveyed use suppliers negotiated through a state government contract. This suggests that a relatively small number of vendors receive a large proportion of local government spend on office and IT equipment. This presents an opportunity for local governments to coordinate purchasing requests so that selected vendors only offer products that comply with energy efficiency standards and other sustainability criteria. When asked what sustainability criteria council currently specifies in tenders and contracts, there was a mixed response. Requests for parts and components guarantee (25%), energy saving features (18%), and compatibility with recycled content consumables (18%) were the most common environmental criteria. Requests for equipment that contained minimal hazardous substance (10%), recyclable casing and parts (7%), and suppliers that take back and recycle old equipment (5%) were not as common. A number of councils believe that procuring equipment through the state government negotiated contracts ensures that suppliers meet with stringent sustainability criteria. This may not be the case, therefore it is prudent that council check what environmental and social criteria is included in procurement documentation and assessments to ensure the purchase complies with councils green IT directives.
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
4.2 Power Management Enablement Some office and IT equipment has inbuilt power management capabilities that allow the device to enter a lower power state after a period of inactivity. The most widely used power management standard in Australia is ENERGY STAR!. Power management is a significant energy conservation measure for several types of equipment such as computers, monitors and printers that are switched on for long periods of time (Australian Greenhouse Office and ICLEI, 2005). Councils were asked a series of questions about their power management settings. Just under half (48%) of all councils have power management features enabled on all of their computers. A further 31% responded that only some computers have power management enabled. Power management settings can be disabled by the user, which could account for this figure. Councils commented: “They are set as default by IT but staff can change them”. “Negotiated between IT and department staff to maximise green settings against user needs”. “Moving to set [power management as default] by IT but receiving a lot of resistance. Over 30% will not shutdown computers at night”. “Decision made on recommendation of IT but ignored by many. Little effective backing by upper management”.
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
4.3 User Behaviour Councils were asked if staff turn off their desktop computers at the end of each day. The majority of respondents observed that staff switch off equipment they are personally responsible for always (11%) or nearly always (65%), whereas staff only switch off communally shared equipment (such as printers) 4% of time.
This suggests it is possible to encourage staff through behaviour change and awareness raising campaigns to switch off their personal equipment at the end of the workday, yet it may be more effective to use timers on communal equipment. Councils employ a range of measures to encourage staff to use equipment more efficiently: Information Provision “Our Smart Growth department often sends out reminders and has developed promotional information around the offices to encourage people to be more energy efficient with… printers, dual copying…”. “Advertising and information, reminders to turn off…” “Through internal communication processes (internal emails)”. Incentives “Internal environmental action group activities, e.g. ‘frog fairy’ randomly leaves chocolate frogs when people switch off their monitors for the night”. Education and Training “The Council's environmental team actively educate our staff [and] engage managers on environmental measures & considerations”. Campaigns “[Council] recently conducted a Switch IT off campaign to encourage staff to switch computers and monitors off at the end of each day”.
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
4.4 Server Virtualisation Server virtualisation involves reducing the amount of physical servers by using virtualisation software to consolidate the workload from a multitude of under-utilised servers onto fewer, more energy efficient servers (IBM Corporation, 2008). Fewer units mean fewer fans; uninterrupted power supplies, network hardware and cooling requirements and thus savings in energy and greenhouse gas emissions can be achieved. Other benefits of server virtualisation include maintained reliability, increased space in server rooms and improved transferability of data. Given this is a relatively new technology, it was interesting to find that 62% of councils had already implemented some server virtualisation and a further 23% have plans to do so in the next 12 months. Many indicated that they had implemented virtualisation in a test environment prior to a staged full implementation. Given the significant reductions in greenhouse gas emissions that can be achieved with server virtualisation, it is promising to see most councils are adopting this new technology. 4.5
Thin Client Terminals A thin client is a network computer without a hard disk drive and involves replacing desktop computers with scaled back terminals, moving the bulk of the data processing onto the server. This saves a significant amount of operational energy and maximises computing resources. Thin client terminals do not need to be replaced as often as desktop computers, which also minimises resource use.
37% of councils surveyed already have thin client terminals in place, with a further 12% planning to implement a switch over in the next 12 months. This uptake is not as strong as the server virtualisation. However, unlike server virtualisation, thin client technology has been around for a longer period, with some councils indicating they had been using thin clients for over 10 years. Some council’s only use such terminals in libraries and remote offices. One council commented that most staff are unhappy with thin clients. Further research would needs to be done to establish the key barriers to the successful uptake of thin client terminals.
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
4.6 Opportunities for Consolidating Stock Increasingly there are multifunction devices and high-capability printers that can service a greater number of users and enable council to rationalise their units. This can help to reduce the operational energy use and cost of procuring consumables for multiple models of equipment. Councils were asked how many users shared a printer. The majority (43%) of councils have allocated one printer to 11 - 20 users. 36% allocated one printer to 1 - 10 users. This is not a particularly efficient way to operate a printing network, with best practice councils allocating one multifunction document centre for up to 40 users (ICLEI Oceania, 2008). Councils were asked what they thought where the main barriers to staff sharing printers. Apart from practicalities such as staff being spread over multiple locations (16%) and specialist needs for equipment (15%), the most common barriers were staff reluctance to walk further to collect print jobs (26%), and fears over confidentiality (24%). The last two reasons are potentially easy to overcome given appropriate management support for sharing printers, and technological solutions that provide users with individual swipe cards that give the command to specifically process print jobs. These are areas that will be investigated through the Switch IT Over Project. 4.7 End-of-Life Disposal A final area of investigation was to establish the usual end-of-life disposal pathways for old equipment. Given the high frequency of product replacement and toxicity of electronic waste, it is important for councils to dispose of their e-waste through channels that are environmentally and socially responsible. Councils were asked what typically happened to old equipment. As figure 14 demonstrates, there are numerous disposal pathways used by councils. Only 16% are returned to the supplier to be recycled or re-used and a further 8% of councils surveyed are prepared to pay a contractor to recycle old equipment. A small percentage (4%) dispose of their waste to
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
landfill. Studies have shown that 80% of equipment that is stockpiled for spare parts ends up in landfill, as the value of equipment decreases the longer it is stored (Matthews et al, 1997). Equipment that is sold onto staff or the public or donated to community groups essentially transfers the cost and responsibility of disposal onto others, albeit may serve a social benefit. The findings suggest there is considerable opportunitys to improve councils’ end-of-life disposal practice for better environmental outcomes.
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Conclusion
This study has enabled ICLEI Oceania to fill an information gap in better understanding local government procurement practice and use of office and IT equipment. The findings of this study will underpin the approach employed in the Cities for Climate Protection! Switch IT Over Project. The findings highlight that a majority of councils undertake a regular schedule for product upgrades, indicating the need for a flexible and accessible project methodology that councils can implement when it suits their individual replacement timelines. Further, the research shows that the Switch IT Over Project will provide a much-needed framework and relevant support materials to assist IS departments to identify the energy use from councils office and IT equipment. This will enable council staff to consider the total cost and impact of product ownership, instead of solely up-front cost, in addition to improving energy reporting and greenhouse gas abatement from green IT initiatives. The research findings also illustrate that improving staff use of equipment and adopting stronger power management approaches are an important focus for action through the Switch IT Over Project, with many councils still struggling to ensure staff switch off equipment outside of business hours. The research findings also demonstrate that councils have significant collective procurement power for office and IT equipment, and could make better use of product specifications to require compliance with energy efficiency and other sustainability criteria. Finally, the survey findings suggest there is a need for councils to assess their end-of-life disposal of old equipment to improve environmental outcomes. These areas will be investigated further through the Switch IT Over Project. ICLEI Oceania will collate detailed case studies of councils that implement successful product switch overs that address staff behaviour change, power management and policy updates to ensure long-lasting organisational support for the sustainable procurement, use and end-of-life disposal of office and IT equipment.
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Research Findings: Local Government Procurement, Management, and Use of Office IT Equipment
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References
Australian Greenhouse Office, ICLEI. (2005). Standby Energy Consumption: Australian Local Government Buildings, (Report 2005/22), Part of the National Appliance and Energy Equipment Efficiency Program, Australian Government. Gartner. (2007). “Gartner Estimates ICT Industry Accounts for 2 Percent of Global CO2 Emissions”, Presentation at Gartner Symposium/IT Expo: Emerging Trends, San Francisco. IBM Corporation. (2008). The green data centre- More than social responsibility: A foundation for growth, economic gain and operating stability, Somers NY. ICLEI Oceania. (2008). Penrith City Council Printer Rationalisation Project: Case Study, interview conducted May, 2008. Matthews, H.S, McMichael, F.C, Hendrickson, C. T and Hart, D.J. (1997). Disposition and End-of-Life Options for Personal Computers, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh. The Green Grid. (2008). The Green Grid Opportunity: Decreasing data centre and other IT energy usage patterns, www.thegreengrid.org [accessed 17/07/08]. Verdiem. (2008). 3 Building Blocks to a Green IT Strategy, [online] www.verdiem.com [accessed 29/09/08].
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Appendix A: Survey Questions
To view the entire survey findings, visit: www.surveymonkey.com/sr.aspx?sm=SO9zCkWJ4YgPsX_2b3FDAeH_2fqZ29ytgU_2fYixv1 N55d2Hw_3d
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