Eco-Institute recommends NAS instead Cloud


The Freiburg Institute for Applied Ecology - short Öko-Institut - advises computer users to swap data on a memory on the home network (NAS) instead of in the cloud. According to the Institute calculations showed that, for example, the saving of 4.7 GBytes generated in a cloud storage 55 kg CO2 equivalent, in an energy efficient home network for the same amount of data dropped to only 150 grams of CO2 equivalent. In addition, acquisition and operation of a local network storage with one terabyte per year cost around 100 euros. The cloud offers the same price, however 100 gigabytes of storage space.

"For those that primarily stores data without network different devices should rely on simple external hard drives," said Ran Liu, research assistant at the Institute for Applied Ecology. With them large amounts of data could be stored easily, and they need only use energy when they are used. It should be 2.5 "models are preferred because they require about two-thirds less power than the 3.5" hard drives. If the disks were supplied exclusively through a single USB port to power, their power could not in any case exceed the recommended value of 2.5 watts.



Even with the NAS, users should rely on energy-efficient and low-noise models, the Institute recommends further. Consumers should look for when buying a NAS power consumption of the devices. An energy-efficient network storage with two hard drives consume a maximum of 58 kilowatt hours per year, an inefficient appliances may double. Also, the devices should have a network standby, the host no more than 4 watts of power.

A study that Microsoft had commissioned, came recently to a different conclusion - at least based on large companies. This could reduce their energy consumption and CO2 emissions by about 30 percent when they use software, e-mails and data rather than on their own computers on the Internet and hold. Maybe it was the software giant push its own online office suite Office 365. Another argument made this year, the environmental organization Greenpeace in the debate and criticized "dirty electricity" in the cloud. Especially Apple, Amazon and Microsoft were not enough focus on renewable energy.

Ecolabel "Blue Angel" criteria such as energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions can be used as cleaner production, pollution-free, health and safety, ease of repair and recycling. External hard disks are already basic criteria, is based on a NAS is still ongoing. They will be available in January 2013. The Institute has developed a method for sustainability analysis for the development of criteria for the award of the "Blue Angel".

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