The World in 2030

192 The World in 2030
reduce the carbon footprint of the event and, if all goes to
plan, the 2012 Olympics will be a showcase of environmental
responsibility.
By 2030 preparations will be well ahead for the Olympic
Games of 2032 which will probably be held in Los Angeles
(2032 will be the centenary of when the Games last visited
the city). How much more carbon-efficient will those Games
be than the Games due to be held in London in a few years’
time? Will near-to-zero energy loss have been achieved or will
the necessary evil of aviation (flying in all the competitors,
spectators and officials) ruin such efforts? Or will the jets of
2032 be running on biofuels?
Other areas where energy efficiency can be vastly
improved include computing and IT, transport and, once
again, power generation and distribution. All areas have huge
potential for energy saving simply because after a century or
more of cheap energy, efficiency has not been the foremost
design parameter when products or projects have been in
development.
In computing I.B.M. has made it clear that significant
savings can be made:
I.B.M. is beginning a $1-billion-a-year investment
program intended to double the energy efficiency of
its computer data centers and those of its corporate
customers.
Many technology companies are trying to curb the
runaway energy consumption of data centers, the