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Oracle has been recognized by CRN magazine as one of sixteen "high-tech green giants" — companies in the field of technology that are "visible advocates for environmental responsibility, espousing green policies for natural resource use and waste disposal, product design and life-cycle principles — along with programs that bring the channel into the process."
At Oracle, a major part of being environmentally responsible has involved maximizing energy efficiency. That practice gained particular importance during the California electricity crisis of 2000 and 2001, during which the state was subjected to extremely high electricity prices and rolling blackouts.
"Suddenly, Oracle management realized that even though the company had its own substation, it was not going to be spared from the outages," says Oracle's Energy Director, Mukesh Khattar.
The realization spurred management to look into ways to drastically reduce the amount of power used at Oracle's headquarters. Khattar was brought onboard, and he began to identify areas in which demand could be cut during peak hours, when the rotating outages occurred.
The first changes Khattar implemented were reducing lighting levels, resetting the air-conditioning system to decrease overcooling, and getting rid of facilities that sapped energy resources — such as non-critical water pumps and fountains.
Khattar cast a critical eye upon everything attached to the power grid, and discovered a number of ways to decrease power use around the clock. He reduced light levels and fixtures in the hallways, stairwells, and elevators, and replaced regular bulbs with more efficient compact fluorescent lamps. He even removed superfluous lighting from inside beverage coolers.
"I thought, 'Employees know what's there, and there's enough light in the room,'" says Khattar. "'They can pick up their soda in the dark.'"
These procedures garnered the company a US$500,000 grant from the California Utilities Commission for reducing power use during peak hours, and cut utilities costs.
"Our energy use bills went down by 10.5% in one year, which equated to approximately US$1,000,000," says Khattar.
"Their goals are admirable and their reductions are impressive," says Sally Tomlinson, executive director of Sustainable Silicon Valley.
Khattar says Oracle's success in reducing energy consumption has required commitment, but in the end, it's the right thing to do — in more ways than one.
"We want to be good corporate citizens, and we want to do things in a cost-effective manner," says Khattar. "Both of those goals are achievable."
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