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V.18 – Green Technology for Better Living
KOMPAS.com – The Information and Communication Technology (ICT) penetration in Indonesia is increasing every year. An increasing number of personal computers (PCs), laptops, netbooks, tablets and mobile phones are considered the culprit of high electricity usage. The growth of startup companies were also considered contributes to the excessive usage of electricity. But the fact is, electricity consumption by the IT industry were not all that bad.
The ICT industry, if managed properly, could potentially support green life, said Rheza Sistiadi, Director of PT. Realta Chakradarma, a hardware and software company for hotel and travel industry.
“From a research in Japan and developing countries, the IT industry only contributes two to three percents of global warming. The rest is caused by factories and vehicles pollution,” said Rheza when interview by Kompas.com, right after #StartupLokal Meetup V.18 at Bina Nusantara University (Binus), Jakarta, Thursday (20/10/2011).
In his opinion, the ICT industry were in fact had the potential to help create green living lifestyle. There are two things to support this, first the ICT industry as replacement product to help people’s lives more environmentally friendly, or secondly the ICT practitioner move to using environmentally friendly software and hardware.
“Without us realizing it, the ICT industry has helped us to become greener. For example the use of e-mail has changed people habit of not using paper to send mails,” explain Rheza.
In the hospitality industry, technology developed by Rheza at Realta allows all departments in a hotel to make sure that all data come and go through one software. This software forms an integrated system that connects all departments, so that all the information are stored and shared paperless.
“Now Realta has applied this system to tablet and cellular phones so that the check in and check out process can be done in mobile devices,” adds Rheza.
E-billing also help lower the use of paper.
For other efficiency, Rheza exemplifies that there is a technology that allows human to control the power usage of skyscraper with a computer system.
“Actually we can develop a technology that commands the building power grid. At a certain time, electricity are turned off, and at a different time all the electricity are turned on, so it doesn’t need more manpower to manage the power grid,” he said.
Another example is an Indonesia digital startup company that help people to become more greener and environmentally friendly, for example www.nebeng.com. This startup is campaigning for fuel efficiency by providing a social network so that car owners can giv a lift to others.
“A lot of other startups were able to support the green lifestyle,” added Rheza.
The second way that can be done to support an eco-friendly ICT industry is by using Cloud Computing. This technology enables efficient hardware and software usage for data centers due to its virtual form.
“There is power savings because they don’t need a lot of server, air conditioning to cool the server room, nor does it need a lot of human resource because clound computing works automatically,” he explained.
In the telecommunication industry, BTS can use a rechargeable battery, or swith to solar power as the power source.
According to Rheza, there are three items needed for ICT industry to help people become greener. First is government regulation.
“The government should require big hardware companies to recycle their unused wastes. The government should also create a policy requiring major manufacturers in the hardware industry to only sell electricity efficient products” he said.
Second, education to improve concern. There should be a periodic workshops and seminars that provide information to people telling them that ICT industry is environmentally safe. Thirs, initiative from businessmen to start thinking about making products or providing services that are environmentally friendly.
These ideas were conveyed by Rheza at #StartupLokal Meetup V.18. The other three speakers are Kurnia Vera L. (co-founder environmental-indonesia.com), Natalia Devina Widjaya (Binus lecturer). and representative from Nebeng.com, also discussed a similar issue, namely the role of ICT industry in Green Life. At the end of the show, a digital community Depok Digital introduced the concept of their communities, followed by announcement of the program “Start Young to Innovate” to be held by Binus in conjuction with the #StartupLokal community.
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