Green Tech

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Friday, October 03, 2008

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UK based network security trends portal OpenXtra warns network managers against four types of attacks. These include email based attacks, where fictitious mail exchanges are used as a vehicle through which worms can be carried into the heart of the network. Then there is Denial of Service (DoS) attack, where the aim of the attacker is to render your systems inoperative for the duration of the attack. Such attacks range in sophistication from a single disgruntled person to a massive, worldwide, cooperative attempt to disrupt a large corporation, bringing to surface, the risk of internal attacks. Next is unauthorized access where the attack will either deprive you from using your system or give partial control of your system to the hacker. Then there are the common trojans and worms, and the fast evolving Wireless Specific Network Security Attacks, where attackers work on the logic that boundaries of wireless networks invariably are outside the pervades of your workplace, making it vulnerable to masquerade IP address attacks.

A strong security checklist should ideally lay emphasis on three points: one, a multi-tiered, multi-domain central administration of all firewalls, VPNs, and IPS gateways and compliance policies in the enterprise; two, virtualization of firewall, VPN, and IPS gateways, and concerned network hardware; and three, automated logging, analysis, and reporting of network and endpoint security events across the enterprise. Though this looks like a lot of investment, one only needs to cleverly choose from vendors who give cost effective solutions with higher shelf life, or a single vendor who has more or less provided most of the functions in it. Check Point is the first entrant in India that has decided to test out its 'security in a box' concept. It's only a matter of time before bigger and smaller vendors jump on to the bandwagon to provide integrated security solution application and products.

Green Buildings and Campuses
Damage to environment can be significantly minimized by creating new 'GREEN' buildings and making existing buildings 'GREEN'. Indian Green Building Council defines a green building as "A green building uses less energy, water and natural resources, creates less waste and is healthier for the people living inside compared to a standard building." If you go by the stats given at Indian green building council's website, India currently has only 259 registered buildings and a mere 29 certified buildings. While we expect this number to go up considerably in coming years as many corporates across India are putting 'going green' as their mission, but it is still a very low number for a nation with a population of more than 1 billion. Not to mention how many buildings, be it home or offices or factories are coming up in India every year. Just imagine how much of damage can be saved to environment and can be prevented if all buildings were green. Adds to it the benefit Indian corporate can get from so called carbon credit business.

In UAE, it has been made mandatory that all buildings coming up in next year will have to comply with its 'Green building code', otherwise their building plans wont be passed. Perhaps Indian government should learn from them and make laws and standards for all buildings to be green. Similar were the words of many Indian top shots, when we visited their green building campuses to find out what they have done to go green. We will give you an insight to their green campuses later in the article. First let us share with you some of the practical ideas and techniques we have learned from these campuses, which will help you to make your buildings green.

Turning your existing building GREEN
It is always easy to start with a new idea, then to incorporate a new idea in to existing system. But turning an existing building that was not built keeping environmental factors in mind is actually not that complex. In fact an existing building has number of factors in favour like existing infrastructure and material. And if the building is very old then it is built to harness natural resources like light and air that in turn is what whole idea about being 'GREEN' is i.e. maximum utilization of existing resources. Now the question arises is, considerations to be taken care of.These are the areas we are trying to focus on in this section. Let us start with the green building rating system: LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) for existing building, developed by USGBC (U S Green Building Council). USGBC also certifies buildings after reviewing them.

LEED for Existing Building: Operation and Maintenance version (LEED-EB: O&M)
\Is the latest rating system (updated from LEED-ED) was built for existing building in both public and private domain as major chunk of commercial buildings existed long before environmental consciousness was gained.? And these buildings are responsible for major carbon emission and consume considerable amount of energy. Now to bring these buildings under green certification and to sustain green nature of newly certified buildings LEED-ED: O&M was formulated. This system requires at least three months of operational data plus building needs to be operational for twelve months before certification process can be initiated. Some other criterias are, only 25% of vacant space is allowed and project scope must cover 100% floor area. Building should also be compliant with local laws and regulations. Prerequisite and credits in LEED-ED: O&M addresses six domains: sustainable site, water efficiency, energy & atmosphere, material & resources, indoor environmental quality and innovation in operation. To attain this certification, first step is to register; this can be done through web site (www.usgbc.org). Once registered, the next phase is data collection and submission that can be done online, through templates on LEED-Online. The review of the submitted data is done and certification is given in last phase, if required one can also appeal after final application review. There is a fee for LEED-EB: O&M certification, details of this fee can be found in 'Register Your Project' section of USGBC website. One important point to note here is that application for certification would be reviewed based on latest version of LEED-ED certificate.

Many simple ways
There are many old buildings and small old offices which don't really have space or architecture to go green but there are many simple and effective steps they can take to reduce carbon emission and lower their power consumption. This can be as simple as using CFL's or switching of all workstations or turning their office into a paper less office, car pooling etc. To give a an example of how powerful these can be, in many companies where not all employees work 24x7, most employees do not switch off their PCs. Now this not only consumes power but in country like India where power goes out often and generators have to work even at nights to ensure those servers meet their 24x7uptime. Now those PCs will also be consuming power from generators, not only increasing the oil consumption, but carbon emission into the air is also increased. Pretty much similar is the case with paper, especially the print outs taken for small purposes. While recycleable print paper is yet to come out commercially, deploying a solution for printing quotas can help organizations in reducing wastage of paper as well as printing cartridges.

LEED New buildings
Process to get LEED certification for new buildings is pretty much the same as for existing buildings. LEED certifications for new buildings have five main categories namely Sustainable Sites,Energy and Atmosphere, Water Efficiency, Materials and Resources, and Indoor Environmental Quality. Plus in additional category, there 5 possible points given if there is any new innovations done in the design process.

According to the rating system, to get certified you would need 26-32 points, and 33-38 points for silver, 39-51 points for gold and lastly 52 to 69 points for platinum. A maximum of 69 possible points can be scored. Guidelines of LEED certification for new buildings and rating system can be found at Indian green building council website and also at US green building council website.

In next few pages we will tell about some of India's beautiful green buildings and campuses and innovations done by them.

Ecofice from Ngenox
So once you have built your green building, how do you monitor how much carbon you are actually emitting into environment? Ngenox has a unique solution called Ecofice, which is basically a carbon footprint monitoring solution. It can do prediction of GHG(Green House Gases) emission and carbon accounting by gathering relevant parameters from electro mechanical devices running in a building such as generators, building management systems etc. It does calculation of green house gas emission based on UNFCCC accepted protocols. It provides real time montiroing and archival of data from facilities present in the building as well as can predict future emission trends based on current emission trends.

Ecofice Dashboard is largely meant for building owners, CEOs etc. Through this dashboard real time data through Graphs can be viewed. These graphs can be fully customized according to requirements.

Solution has seven key modules which can also be easily customized depending upon the needs. its first module Methodology Definition consists of standard and custom methodologies for calculation of GHG emissions. The methodologies created here are then assigned to particular organization or business unit in its next module called Methodology Assignment. Its next module Parameter configuration is where constants and factors linked with methodology as well as GHG combination of factor type, values etc can be configured.

Next is Automated and Manual Data Entry module is where integration with BMS and SCADA interfaces is configured. There is also a provision for manual data entry Next is very interesting feature called Simulation Analysis. Here with its in-built simulation engine Ecofice allows you to see future GHG emission according to the parameters defined. Ecofice also provides detailed reporting. It allows users to generate business as well as organizational reports based on individual emission values for a chosen period. Reports can also be exported into standard formats like xls and pdf. Lastly also present is a Dashboard which gives one shot view of all key performance indicators configured for an organization. The dashboard displays data in real time and can also be fully customized.

Overall Ecofice is a useful software, it can help users with issues like emission management, carbon monitoring during construction as well as post construction. It can also help buildings to comply with carbon related legislations and provide all relevant information you need if you are into carbon trading. More information about the product can be found at http://www.evolve.ngenox.com/ecofice.html

The Eco-Friendly Face of Wipro
A close contact at the communications team of Wipro told us that Chairman Azim Premji, who lives less than half a kilometer away from the corporate office in Bangalore, is often seen taking late evening walks along the corridors and boulevards that lead to his office, and makes it a point to personally have all lights, and power equipment turned off to conserve energy. It is not surprising then that all of Wipro's facilities boast of ISO certifications for environmental sensitivity and at least 14% reduction on an average, of power and energy consumption. Apparently, the motto of conservation is embedded in the basic design of all Wipro properties-initiatives ranging from maximum utilization of natural light, retaining landscapes and natural water sources, building water recycling plants everywhere possible and educating employees on the whys and hows of reducing power. Take for instance the corporate office which PCQuest visited. The latest initiative here is to replace all the tube lights in the parking lots and path connecting the different office blocks with home grown LED tubes which reduces power consumption by a fourth and ensures that they run for up to 50,000 hours before requiring a replacement. As a pilot project, mini LED lamps are placed along the campus, on the lawns, serving as path lighting systems, and also at various points in the underground parking lot. The technology, which Wipro is currently in the process of mastering, hopes to replicate and maybe even sell to consumers as part of its retail electrical division. The power for these LED tubes comes from solar panels that have been installed on the roofs. On a relatively sunny day, these can work up to late mornings after successfully lighting up the campus all night. The other interesting initiative is utilization of recycled water in the restrooms and for watering plants and other vegetation, which forms more than 80% of the 80 acre plot. Food waste at other facilities in Bangalore, like the Electronics City campus have undertaken an endeavor to collect the waste food after consumption by the employees and have an active vermiculture facility. The same campus also churns out tons of waste paper every month, which is recycled in house and used as scribbling pads for employees. But what really sets Wipro apart from the rest of the tech companies is the fact that it has a dedicated team of employees constantly brainstorming on various ways to conserve energy. Wipro houses a consortium of employees who meet regularly to chalk out conservation of plans-called Eco Eye. Among other short and long term initiatives, this consortium works with internal and external partners to involve more employees to support the cause, with simple starting points like carpooling and reducing wastage of canteen food.

The replacement of tube lights in the parking lots and path connecting the different office blocks of Wipro with home grown LED tubes.

Delta Green Factory
Delta Group launched its first green factory in Rudrapur, Uttarakhand in August. Delta is widely known for its power management solutions, visual displays, industrial automation and its networking products. As part of the Delta's green mission, this eco-friendly factory is spread across 16657.48 square meters which uses various energy saving and waste reduction techniques to provide a healthy environment for its employees. 60 % of the factory area is open and green.

Turbo Ventilation fans at the roof of the delta factory which help in reducing overall temprature of the factory

Eco-friendly green materials such as, fly ash, gypsum and brick cova were used in the construction with low VOC paints to reduce toxic emission. The factory utilizes natural light harvesting, and on a sunny day major part of the factory can work without using artificial lights and any dark spots. The factory also uses Turbo ventilation to lower temperatures in the factory by 2 to 3 degrees; it has some odd 215 turbo fans at the roof of the factory. According to delta Natural Light Harvesting,Turbo Ventilation reduces carbon emissions by 36800 and 55200 pounds respectively.

Front view of Delta's Green Factory in Rudrapur

Solar panels in the factory building are placed intelligently according to the position of the sun to get enough sunlight, and delta claims that these solar panels would reduce the carbon emission levels by 5 million pounds. Also used is linear panel polynum insulation which saves electric energy due to minimum requirement of forced cooling. For its air conditioning delta has used R 407 eco-friendly gas.

Solar panels around the factory are placed intelligently, to recieve maximum sunlight. according to the position of sun.

Factory also saves electric energy by using 0.99 power factor instead of 0.85. As per delta, this saves electric energy by 12 to 15%. For recycling and reuse of water purposes, the building also has sewage treatment plant. The plant uses Anaerobic Bacterial action for recycling of water and recycled water is mainly used for non contact applications. At the back of the factory, there is also a storm water harvesting site for water conservation which gives factory a nice landscape.

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