Enterprise strategies for reducing the life-cycle energy use and greenhouse gas emissions of personal computers

Abstract

This paper examines the effectiveness of several important enterprise strategies for reducing the life-cycle energy use and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of office computers. A modeling framework is presented, which quantifies the annual primary energy use and GHG emissions necessary to maintain and operate an enterprise personal computer (PC) stock. The case of a California-based enterprise with 5,000 desktop PCs is considered as a baseline scenario. The model is applied to estimate technically-achievable reductions in life-cycle energy use and GHG emissions associated with six common enterprise PC management strategies, as compared to the baseline scenario. The total technical potential for primary energy savings is estimated at roughly 60%; the total technical potential for GHG savings is estimated at roughly 35%.