GreenOps: the public sector’s next efficiency opportunity

For public sector organisations under pressure to reduce both costs and carbon emissions, sustainability can often feel like another complex transformation challenge. But according to Kev Gray, client principal at Equal Experts, some of the biggest gains come from far simpler actions: shutting down unused infrastructure, extending the life of existing hardware and tackling the digital waste hidden across government estates.

In this Q&A, Gray discusses why “ghost” computing remains a major problem, how GreenOps is emerging alongside FinOps, and what practical steps government technology leaders can take today to reduce their environmental footprint.

You recently said that the most sustainable server is the one you never switch on. What’s the reality for government organisations?

The biggest sustainability wins in government don’t require flashy new tech, just better management of the tech we already have. A huge portion of the public sector’s digital carbon footprint comes from ‘ghost’ computing, and by migrating critical services and decommissioning environments that should have been turned off 18 months ago. The Defra group has seen costs drop and carbon reductions follow. Ultimately, the most impactful sustainability work often looks like basic IT hygiene: turning off a server that should have been decommissioned 18 months ago.

What does that digital waste look like in the public sector?

We see three key forms of digital waste: zombie infrastructure, where servers and cloud services are scaled for peak demand but never scaled back; test environments left running 24/7 when they’re only used during office hours; and bloated code that burns excess CPU cycles every time it runs.

Then there’s physical e-waste. Globally 80 percent of hardware ends up in landfill, and between 2023 and 2024. The constant cycle of hardware refresh inflates our total carbon footprint.

Why is it so hard for teams to just switch things off?

It’s notoriously difficult, largely due to a deeply entrenched lack of lifecycle planning. Legacy IT that’s outside vendor support or bespoke arrangements is often the direct result of a failure to plan for the end of a contract or a product or service’s end of life. Early planning for contract expiry or transition and data decommissioning is frequently skipped, leaving organisations locked into ageing infrastructure with mounting technical debt. Added to this is the ‘spaghetti factor’ where fragmented public sector data means it’s easy to inadvertently break one system or service by shutting down another. It comes down to a lack of lifecycle planning.

Funding models are geared towards new programmes rather than unglamorous maintenance or remediation – leaders are rarely promoted for retiring legacy systems, so the strategic focus naturally leans towards new initiatives.

Where are the biggest opportunities to cut emissions right now?

The one that springs to mind is cloud optimisation. HMRC saved more than £1 million annually simply by identifying under-utilised AWS instances, and there are many easy wins like this.

Another massive opportunity exists in hardware lifecycle management and circularity. The extraction, manufacture, and distribution of end-user devices are primary sources of the ICT sector’s emissions. Government organisations can drastically cut emissions by moving to the provision of refurbished end-user devices by default, utilising analytics-driven device refreshes to extend hardware lifespans, and implementing strict power management configurations across their estates.

How does “GreenOps” differ from “FinOps”?

They’re two sides of the same coin. While FinOps asks how can we lower the bill, GreenOps asks how can we lower the carbon? GreenOps is highly compelling in the public sector, because eliminating compute waste achieves both financial and sustainability targets simultaneously.

In practice, GreenOps might mean scale-to-zero, where we design architectures that automatically power down when idle, or tiered storage that moves archival data to energy-efficient cold storage. It might also refer to green coding, which is writing leaner software that demands less of the processor.

With the rise of AI, how do we innovate without spiking our carbon footprint?

We have to work with suppliers to set strict Cooling Efficiency Ratio (CER) and PUE (Power Usage Effectiveness) requirements for the data centres powering these tools. The government can also steer AI development toward AI growth zones with high clean energy capacity, and ensure that developers follow Greener Service Principles to keep AI models from running redundantly.

What are the first steps for a government CIO who wants to reduce waste today?

You don’t need a major transformation programme to start. First, I’d suggest a zombie audit, where you conduct a ruthless sweep of the estate to find and kill unused servers and non-production environments that run over weekends. Second, create a circular policy that mandates all net-new hardware requests be fulfilled using refurbished stock first. Defra is a good example where this is already happening where they are working with a specialised provider to source laptops for their staff. Third, ensure that every device on the network has its power management settings turned on and optimised. If it isn’t providing value, it shouldn’t be drawing power. And fourth, remove all unused equipment and software licenses from the network.