At one point people believed that the green movement was just another trend like acid-washed jeans or quiz shows, but it’s clear that the green movement is here to stay. People care about the environment and in some cases so do corporations, although many people believe that they are being motivated by their purse strings and not their heart strings. But regardless of a person’s or corporation’s motivation the result is the same. So how can businesses same money and save the environment at the same time? It’s simple really.

Solar Panels

Solar panels are exactly new technology but recently corporations have been using them in innovative way to not only save money but make money as well. Most large office complexes also have large parking lots, many of which have covered parking spaces. Lately companies have realized that they can replace the otherwise useless normal sheet metal that is used to provide covered parking with solar panels. Some places like Arizona State University’s West campus have converted entire parking lot to use solar panel covered parking in turn creating a massive solar panel array. These solar panel array can generate large amounts of energy which can help businesses cut costs and depend on a business’ energy uses can even generate money by selling the surplus energy back to a utility.

Cloud Computing

Most businesses run complex services and operations that require large databases and servers, which are often housed onsite. Maintaining large severs  can be costly for any company and usually extends into the thousands of dollars, because it not just about buying severs, it’s about keeping them cool, backing up the content they store, and hiring people to operate them . A  company’s carbon impact can expand significantly just by having to manage a few servers. In a n effort to save money and reduce their carbon footprint several companies have begun relying on cloud computing. Cloud computing refers to using the dedicated server and computational resources of another company such as Amazon or Media Temple, which have massive data centers. Cloud computing in essence offloads all of the computing resources to another location  that is specifically designed just for computer server maintenance. By using cloud computing a company can eliminate the cost and carbon footprint associated with operating an in-house server or server room.  Marlabs inc, a business processing company is one of a few companies to recognize the benefits of adopting cloud computing. And in a recent presentation detailed some of the many benefits of cloud computing beyond just saving energy and reducing carbon emissions. This presentation can be viewed on the Marlabs public Slideshare page.