Financial Management and Contributed by Organizations or Campuses

Some simple fixes in the data center can add hard cash to an enterprise's bottom line.

"CIO William Hill had an admirable, if unanticipated, return on investment when he overhauled the IT infrastructure for Dayton, Ohio: He helped the environment. Hill's strategy included replacing the old setup -- a disorganized mix of 80 archaic networked terminals and numerous ad hoc PCs of varying ages and operating systems -- with thin clients for 60% of the staff and PCs for the rest, strategically positioned for optimum use. Hill opted for thin clients for technological and cost reasons, but says he saw a corresponding drop in how much energy his organization uses -- a drop that saves the city between $60,000 and $90,000 annually."

From cars to condos, "green" is all the rage these days — and IT is no exception. Eco-friendly computing promises the twin win of saving money and the environment. In this groundbreaking awards program, Computerworld honors 12 user companies and another dozen vendors that are leading the way.

For most companies, the movement is about saving money, not the environment. But it's getting better at both.

Inside the minds-and budgets-of chief information officers and IT directors.