The energy efficiency benefits of cloud computing are substantial, and growth in the market will have important implications for both energy consumption and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, said the cleantech market intelligence firm.

According to Pike Research, the market for cloud computing services has expanded quickly during the past few years, offering a compelling alternative to traditional data center operations, but up to this point relatively little of the industry emphasis has been on the potential for energy savings.

As part of its cloud computing adoption scenario, Pike Research forecasts that data centers will consume 139.8terawatt hours (TWh) of electricity in 2020, a reduction of 31 percent from 201.8TWh in 2010.

This also represents a significant decrease from the 226.4TWh that would be consumed by data centers in the firm’s BAU scenario. The reduction will drive total data center energy expenditures down from $23.3 billion in 2010 to $16 billion in 2020, as well as causing a 28 percent reduction in GHG emissions from 2010 levels.

Eric Woods, senior analyst at Pike Research, said : “The growth of cloud computing will have a very significant positive effect on data center energy consumption. Few, if any, clean technologies have the capability to reduce energy expenditures and GHG production with so little business disruption.

“Software as a service, infrastructure as a service, and platform as a service are all inherently more efficient models than conventional alternatives, and their adoption will be one of the largest contributing factors to the greening of enterprise IT.”

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