My invited perspective article, “Moving beyond benefit-cost analysis of climate change”, was just posted by the open access on-line journal Environmental Research Letters. Here’s the abstract and the introduction. Abstract The conventional benefit–cost approach to understanding the climate problem has serious limitations. Fortunately, an alternative way of thinking
Read moreCold Cash, Cool Climate: Science-based Advice for Ecological Entrepreneurs was recently honored as a finalist in the Science: General category of the 2013 USA Best Book Awards. To see the list of 2013 winners, go here. In May of this year, the book was awarded an honorable mention in the
Read moreThe Annual Review of Environment and Resources has just released their Volume 38, which contains our latest article, titled “Smart Everything: Will Intelligent Systems Reduce Resource Use? (CLICK ON THE TITLE LINK TO DOWNLOAD A FREE COPY!)”. The article provides a broad look at the progress of distributed mobile computing
Read moreIn a white paper I wrote for Samsung last fall (Koomey 2012), I analyze the economics of purchasing green DRAM for servers. Assessing the economics of efficiency improvements in IT equipment requires knowledge not just of energy prices and energy savings, but also of the avoided infrastructure costs associated with
Read moreI and two former students of mine, Nicole Schuetz and Anna Kovaleva, just completed a wonderful case study of eBay’s transition to more efficient data center operations. As readers of this blog know, the barriers to achieving higher efficiency data centers are not primarily technical. Instead, they are mainly
Read moreKen and Margot Brill, with Ken reading to one of our sons, on May 8, 2011. Photo credit: Jonathan Koomey. My dear friend Ken Brill passed away on July 30th, and a few of his colleagues and I gathered with Ken’s family in Maine on August 17th of this
Read moreWhat makes a great man? Jonathan Koomey St. Albans Episcopal Church Cape Elizabeth, Maine August 17, 2013 We’re here to honor the life of a good friend and a great man: Ken Brill. In preparing for this event, I contacted many of Ken’s friends and colleagues, all of
Read moreEulogy for Ken Brill Martin McCarthy St. Albans Episcopal Church Cape Elizabeth, Maine August 17, 2013 I loved Ken Brill. It took me 50 years of my life to get ready to meet this man, but I loved him. And in the last 5 years he’s been such an
Read moreIn honor of Ken Brill John Thornell St. Albans Episcopal Church Cape Elizabeth, Maine August 17, 2013 As the father of the data center industry, Ken has many accomplishments to his name. These accomplishments are the product of an insatiable curiosity, and an unrelenting passion, focus and drive. Sometimes this
Read moreHomily in Celebration and Thanksgiving for the life of Ken Brill The Rev. Timothy A. Boggs St. Albans Episcopal Church Cape Elizabeth, Maine August 17, 2013 Please pray with me for a moment. Gracious God, please listen this hour to our words of joyful thanks and our sighs of grief.
Read moreWhat follows is the statement of values Ken Brill shared with all his new employees in the twelve years that I knew him. They reflect the kind of man he was: someone who cared about people and who valued truth above all else, even when inconvenient or unprofitable. Brill Family
Read morehttp://www.macrumors.com/2013/09/11/how-apple-ships-millions-of-iphones-for-simultaneous-delivery/
Read moreThere’s been a lot of talk recently about how new computer tools can help us derive meaning from data that haven’t been pre-structured for ease of machine readability. Of course, all data are structured in some way, but some forms of structure are easier for computers to handle
Read moreDave Roberts had a wonderful post on August 30th, 2013 titled “Hope and Fellowship”, which addresses the question “Is there any hope? Or are we just f*cked?” Here’s his brilliant summary: And really, what else are we going to do? Remember, there is no “too late” here, no
Read moreI just encountered another example of how re-imagining the way we deliver services can enable very low-cost access to communications. My friend RJ Honicky wrote a paper in 2007 with colleagues at UC Berkeley describing how a “voice message mostly” mobile phone system could lead to improved equipment utilization, better
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