ECONET (low
Energy
COnsumption
NETworks) project
is a 3-year IP project (running from October 2010 to September 2013) co-funded by
the European Commission under the Framework Programme 7 (FP7), addressing the Strategic
Objective ICT-2009.1.1 “The Network of the Future”.
The ECONET project aims at studying and exploiting dynamic adaptive technologies
(based on standby and performance scaling capabilities) for wired network devices
that allow saving energy when a device (or part of it) is not used.
The project will be devoted at re-thinking and re-designing wired network equipment
and infrastructures towards more energy-sustainable and eco-friendly technologies
and perspectives.
Enabling the reduction of energy requirements of wired network equipment by
50%
As the
Future Internet is taking shape, it is therefore recognised
that, among other basic concepts and key aspects,
energy efficiency
should pervade the network infrastructure as a whole to such extent as to become
part of the network design criteria and to carry across multiple networking domains
for the achievement of a general target. There are two main motivations that drive
the quest for
“green” networking: environmental one, related to
the reduction of wastes and impact on CO
2 emissions, and
the economic one, stemming from the need of operators to reduce the cost of keeping
the network up and running at the desired service level, while counterbalancing
the ever-increasing cost of energy.
The overall idea is to introduce novel green network-specific paradigms and concepts
enabling the reduction of energy requirements of wired network equipment by 50%
in the short to mid-term (and by 80% in the long run).
To this end, the main challenge will be to design, develop and test novel technologies,
integrated control criteria and mechanisms for network equipment enabling energy
saving by
adapting network capacities and resources to current traffic loads
and user requirements, while ensuring end-to-end Quality of Service.
Therefore, this project aims at exploring a coordinated set of approaches and concepts
to deliver novel solutions and technologies for reducing the carbon footprint of
next generation infrastructures for telecommunication networks. Thanks to the presence
of major manufacturing companies, telecoms and ISPs, ECONET will propose its innovative
technologies to standardization bodies for extending in the green direction the
next generation network and Future Internet architectures and protocols.
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