Discussions

As we are discussing the SIG future directions and work items, here's some early results. As you might remember, Albert and I got a task during the kick-off meeting in Vienna March 2016. We were asked to draft a "manifesto" based on few key ideas: outreach sustainable practical influence Right, it was a tricky job and it took some time, but we have a draft. You may call it "December manifesto" if you like.  The draft is in our new Wiki. You can find all the document structural and writing guidelines in it: SCOPE SIG manifesto draft Please, provide feedback, corrections, additional ideas etc! The current text without editorial remarks is as follows: "The research and education networking community in Europe has existed for decades. It has achieved many milestones, one of the most important being the GÉANT network. The human networking and cross-border collaboration has made the advances possible. The work is far from over as new challenges emerge because of continuous technological development and the impact that has on society. Therefore the NREN community under the auspices of GÉANT is establishing a new special interest group for transforming the research and education service development and the service delivery chain. New services are established at an accelerating rate because of the evolution and development IT technology. Therefore the service interoperability and the cohesion of the research and education services are in jeopardy. In general, we and society as a whole find it more difficult to understand the impact all these changes have. Combine this with the societal pressure of operating carbon neutral in the near future and it becomes essential to understand the impact ICT technology has on various levels and to know how to best use it. In terms of environmental sustainability, ICT can even be used to reduce our footprint if we use it right. The GÉANT community must therefore raise the awareness of the environmental impacts and issues. Support has to be provided to build sustainable infrastructures for the higher education community. We are obliged to provide practical guidelines, which can be easily applied and deployed. The existing experience should be shared in order to develop and perfect the knowledge for mutual benefit. Therefore, the GÉANT community will initiate collaboration and establish a special interest group, which will: facilitate knowledge exchange and collaboration between IT staff, with a focus on campus issues and green IT technologies; enable the continued production of documentation regarding campus best practices and environmental sustainability; foster face-to-face and online meetings, providing a breeding ground to discuss, elaborate and disseminate early thoughts, brought in by members of the research and education community that can evolve into best practice documents; co-organize trainings (jointly with organizations requesting them), liaising at the same time with GÉANT training activities; coordinate the revision of existing campus best practice and green team documents, on a need basis, encouraging document re-use. The general awareness of the situation and the possible solutions can be raised by collaborative efforts, where the key messages and information is delivered to the community. The work can be done by using the existing co-operation networks, groups and partners. The building of sustainable infrastructures can be supported by sharing the practices, by providing the tools to create realistic metrics and by benchmarking the activity between comparable entities. The possibility to see the work of the peers and to learn together is the best lesson, which will be remembered. The continuous discussion in the community is essential. The challenging debate will clarify the meaning and sharpen the expression. The intentions of the authors are clear at the time, but the future adopters and generations need an explanation to see the reason. The work of the engineers is based on facts. Therefore, guidelines are needed, which are on a suitable level to recreate a compatible system. A document repository will be created and maintained, which serves as safe for the technical blueprints. Special attention is paid to the general availability and easy accessibility of the content. We see that these actions will open a route to more sustainable and compatible research and education IT infrastructures, and a green future."  

At GEANT office in Cambridge, we have separate bins in the kitchen for plastics, paper, cardboard, etc., and for IT equipment, we have a policy of transferring them to a 3rd party who dispose of them in an environmentally friendly manner. The latter was the case during GN4-1, and needs to be looked at if it is the same or has changed/improved in any way.