There is this whole hype with the environment and going green. Is there such thing as a green web hosting service? You know like some that may be solar powered and such?

Some datacenters are upgrading to newer servers that use up less energy, and some claim to use hybrid servers, or even planting a tree when you order a server. Only way to really tell I think would be to visit a datacenter who went green to see for your self.

yes,There Is.
Actually Hosting companies use less power,or you can say use renuable energy to support their hardware.
This is termed as Green.

There's a few companies out there that are using wind and solar for their power needs, but not at 100% usage. They still have backup generators etc on site, and are still connected to the grid for power. I don't know of any companies that are 100% separate.

One of the bigger trends right now are hosting companies buying Carbon Credits. While this doesn't make them a "GREEN" company, it does show that they are attempting to HELP the environment.

Lately we been upgrading our servers with Green Hard Drives, and CPUs. A lot of hardware are coming out which uses less energy.

Many datacenters are claiming to be "Green" by using alternative energy sources such as solar, wind, etc.

We've been using the Antec Green (80+ Certified) power supplies in many of our servers, there seems to be a noticeable difference in the draw on the "green" servers vs the standard ones. It's not a huge difference, but its better than nothing I suppose. Plus it helps the electricity bill once you have a few hundred green PSU's instead of a few hundred standard PSU's

Although unfortunately it seems a few companies are using it more as a marketing ploy than anything.

the people who claim they are using solar and wind power actually do not - what happens is they use the same dirty power and then purchase credits from a company who supply a power grid with wind or soloar power -
use of less power on servers is great - and every little bit helps but i agree with web space - most are using it a pure marketing ploy and hype - the other sad thing is .. i know a few hosting companies that claim are green and have this entire section on their entire data center is powered by wind blah blah -- and i know 100% it is no - since their cage is down the hall from our colo room -- sad but true

You can reduce your carbon footprint by simply getting efficient with your usage of resources. Using the newer CPU's definitely save on power.

There is no government or legal definition of "a green company". It's a marketing phrase designed to make people believe that they're giving their money to a business that conducts its operations in as environmentally-intelligent a manner as possible. That isn't always the case.

If a company has recycle bins in its offices, uses soy-based inks, and encourages employees to take alternate transportation - they can call themselves a "green company" but still produce a huge amount of industrial waste and / or carbon dioxide.

"Green web hosting" may be accurate...or it may be another "bull---t promise". There isn't usually a way for the consumer to confirm or deny a web host's claims of "being green".

Hopefully, solar/wind/water power will continue to develop, mature, and stabilize; and one day we may look on old banners for "green web hosting" the same way we look on some web designer sites of the mid 1990s who advertised "we build your web site, and we'll add links!"

Yep, if a company says their going green, they should really do it. Becuase when their busted, their whole company is ruined by the bad rep. they will get.

Its very nice to answer this thread, i am basically an environmental engineering by profession, done research on climate change and global warming, still working on the energy consumption of educational instituions and data centers in India.

The actual concept of going green literally means " reducing the carbon foot print of data centers of the data centers which are the heart of any business who need online presence" In the recent years there was a sudden surge in number of internet users, thereby increasing the number of data centers supporting them

Prior to this the methodology the data centers are operating consumed heavy power, thats where the actual focus is given, this days the energy consumption is increasing the operating cost, no data center actual want to support environment but willing to reduce their energy bills so promoting them as energy saving DC.

The truth is the method they are adopting to reduce energy consumption this days will be fruitfull only after 6-10 years of running, for an example green servers, green buildings, low AC usage by proper ventillation, high quality servers which consumes lower power, proper planning while constructing the DC will save enrgy

One small ex, consider two processors if one is built in 90nm technology and other is built in 65nm technology the 65 nm technology processor obviously consumes less energy, also a typical Desktop CPU consumes anywhere in the range of 140 -160 watts then you think about the power consumption of one server.

Mainly green DC runs on low power consuming servers, low power consuming networking systems, increasing the number of blade servers etc.

There are lot of research going on in this area, one of my friend from bangalore works for Intel research center here in this processor power consumption stated that soon there will be processors consuming 50% of the current power usage

I think most web hosting companies use it as a marketing tool in my opinion. If I ever get my own DC I will actually do something like plant a tree or more.

The Green Data Center Blog is a great resource for info on this:
http://www.greenm3.com/

Great website!! Steve Do you work at a DC?

The quick answer is YES. My desk is in one of our network operations centers. We monitor 3 data centers from here and one other NOC.