Current project partners:
Past project partners:
(for NSF CNS-0519951)
(for NSF CNS-0721858)
Past funding from:
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This project addresses the increasingly critical need to improve the energy
efficiency of the Internet by focusing on the primary and often neglected energy
consumer, edge devices. Unfortunately, due to limits of existing protocols and
architectures, networked desktop computers typically remain powered-up during
frequent and often lengthy periods of idleness. As network devices, they are
prevented from operating in an energy-efficient manner due to their need to
respond to network transactions of various types without warning. In this
project, we address network induced energy use for current and future
edge devices. We also address reducing the direct energy use of
high-speed links connecting these edge devices to the Internet.
Significant outcomes and events:
- The
Second International Workshop on Green Communications was organized
as part of GLOBECOM 2009. Ken
Christensen was one of the four organizers of this workshop.
- The notion of a power state MIB was presented at IETF by Juergen Quittek,
see
here.
- The EPA
EPA Energy Star Program Requirements for Computers, Version 5.0 now
states that "Proxying refers to a computer that maintains Full Network
Connectivity as defined in Section 1 of this specification. For a system to
qualify under the proxying weightings above, it must meet a non-proprietary
proxying standard that has been approved by the EPA and the European Union
as meeting the goals of ENERGY STAR." (page 11). Our work has contributed
to this specification by defining how proxying can achieve network connectivity
for sleeping PCs.
- An Ecma task group
TC38-TG4 - Proxying Support for Sleep Modes has been created with the
scope of "Network proxying of ICT devices to reduce energy consumption" with
work to include "To develop Standards and Technical Reports for network
proxying; a proxy is an entity that maintains network presence for a
sleeping higher-power ICT device." The standard (1st edition) is now complete
and is available
here.
- The First International
Workshop on Green Communications was organized as part of
ICC 2009. Ken
Christensen is one of the four organizers of this workshop.
- This project was awarded the 2008 State of Florida "Excellence in
Sustainability through Information Technology" award by
ITFlorida.
- The UPnP Forum released standardized
service descriptions for
Low Power V1.0 in August 2007. This includes a UPnP proxy to which we
made contributions (see
here). Jakob Klamra (student) is specifically listed as a contributor
on the UPnP Forum standard.
- An IEEE 802.3
Energy Efficient Ethernet Study Group was established in November 2006 and is
now the IEEE 802.3az Task Force.
The task force is currently moving towards standardization with ideas that
originate from our early Ethernet Adaptive Link Rate (ALR) (see
slide 5).
The contacts for this project are
Ken Christensen at the
University of South Florida and
Ann Gordon-Ross at the
University of Florida. A key collaborator
is Bruce Nordman at
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.
Bruce is the PI for the Energy
Efficient Digital Networks project at LBNL.
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