PORTLAND, Ore., Feb. 14, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- The Green Grid, the global authority on resource efficient information technology and data centers, is pleased to announce the full event agenda and presentation topics for its Sixth Annual Forum and Members Meeting. The two-day event will feature sessions led by leading companies and organizations from around the globe, including eBay, EMC, the Environmental Protection Agency, Google, Microsoft and many more.

The Green Grid Forum 2013 will be held March 5-6, 2013 at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, Calif. The event will be one of the largest gatherings of resource efficient IT experts in the country. For two days, representatives from government, industry, the non-profit sector and member companies of The Green Grid will exchange ideas, collaborate, discuss and debate ways to improve the resource efficiency and sustainability of data centers and the IT industry as a whole.   

"On a global scale we're seeing more and more engagement from both industry and government to make significant strides towards a more resource efficient and sustainable future in data centers and beyond," said John Pflueger, Dell representative and Board Member of The Green Grid. "The Green Grid Forum is more than just another IT event, it's a gathering of the top minds from all spectrums of resource efficiency that come together to not only share results, but to generate ideas that will dramatically improve our industry – and ultimately our planet."

Forum 2013, which is The Green Grid's largest event of the year, will host more than 30 sessions and will provide attendees with the unique opportunity to engage with peers, customers, governing bodies and industry representatives all under the same roof. The event's sessions will fall under four key pillars: The Value of Collaborative Regulatory Activity, Software and IT Hardware Efficiencies, Financial and Operational Efficiencies, and Challenges and Opportunities of Big Data. Individual sessions will examine how each pillar can and will impact the data center and IT industries in 2013 and beyond.

Within the Value of Collaborative Regulatory Activity pillar, a dynamic panel session titled "Standards Today, Regulations Tomorrow" will take an in-depth look at standards and how the data center industry would change if regulators and governments across the world had ISO standards to reference. The Financial and Operational Efficiencies pillar will feature sessions led by experts from Digital Realty Trust, eBay, Fjord IT, Google, Interxion, Microsoft, Thomson Reuters, among others. Several other noteworthy sessions, events and case studies being presented at Forum 2013 include:

• Fine-tuning Operations to Enable Business Growth and Drive Efficiency: Rohini Jain, Marketplaces Technology Finance Lead at eBay, will discuss ideas around enabling growth and efficiency at one of the world's largest online retailers.
• Case Study: EMC's Durham Data Center: EMC will present a case study on its 20,000 square foot energy-efficient and 100-percent virtual data center in North Carolina.
• Current and Short-Term Projected State of ENERGY STAR: Robert "RJ" Meyers, the Data Center Products lead at the EPA's ENERGY STAR Program, will present an update on the current status and accomplishments of the ENERGY STAR program, as well as look at its plans for the next several years, with a focus on the IT and data center areas.
• Google's Data Centers: A behind the Scenes Look at Infrastructure and Innovations. Joe Kava, Data Center Operations Executive at Google, will offer an exclusive look at the data center operations at one of the largest and fastest growing internet companies in the world.
• Digestion to Data: Powering the Cloud with Waste Materials: Sean James, Senior Research Program Manager at Microsoft, will discuss the research and development of the first zero carbon data center – called the Data Plant – that will be completely independent of the grid and will recycle common waste bi-products to sustainably power cloud services.

For more information about Forum 2013 or to register, please visit: http://www.thegreengrid.org/events/TGGforum-2013.aspx.

About The Green Grid

The Green Grid is a global consortium of companies, government agencies, educational institutions and individuals dedicated to advancing resource efficiency in information technology and data centers with a holistic approach, including all IT, facility and infrastructure systems. As the global authority on resource efficient information technology and data centers, The Green Grid spans the entire computing and communications ecosystem – from data centers to personal computers – and will continue to provide the global IT industry with metrics, tools and best practices to improve resource efficiency.

The Green Grid does not endorse vendor-specific products or solutions, and instead seeks to provide industry-wide recommendations on best practices, metrics and technologies that will improve overall resource efficiencies. Membership is open to organizations at the Contributor, General or Associate Member levels, and individuals at the Individual Member level.

For more information, visit www.thegreengrid.org or connect with The Green Grid on Twitter @TheGreenGrid, Facebook http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Green-Grid/263092707057658 and LinkedIn http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=2492375

SOURCE The Green Grid