Sentilla Blog

In October, 2009, President Obama issued an Executive Order (EO 13514) that set federal energy efficiency standards.  EO 13514 superceeds the previous executive order put in place by President Bush (EO 13423) from 2007.  While the previous order required the government to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 3% per year, totaling at least a 30% reduction by 2015 from 2003 levels, Obama's order actually lets each department set their own goal.  EO 13514, in contrast to EO 13423, is much more specific about the improvements that have to be made in transportation fleets, building design, etc.  Just to be clear, this order only applies to federal government and their respective organizations, not the country at large.  You can think of it as a government-specific climate bill.

What's more important, is that EO 13514 has specific language about data centers.  Federal organizations must "implement best management practices for energy-efficient management of servers and Federal data centers."  The goal is to bring the Federal government in line with commercial best practices.  The government has thus set some very generic "Guiding Principals", and then it is up to each of the organizations to meet their stated GHG goals for Class 1, Class 2, and Class 3 emissions. Let's take a look at what some of the government organizations have done to comply with EO 13514.