Server utilization, the business bottom line, and green web hosting

The striving for optimal efficiency (handling more requests per second) is not just about the geeky satisfaction that comes from optimization. There are real business and environmental benefits. Handling more requests per second, as Node.js servers can do, means the difference between buying lots of servers and buying only a few servers. Node.js potentially lets your organization do more with less.

Roughly speaking, the more servers you buy, the greater the cost, and the greater the environmental impact of having those servers. There's a whole field of expertise around reducing costs and the environmental impact of running web server facilities, to which that rough guideline doesn't do justice. The goal is fairly obvious—fewer servers, lower costs, and a reduced environmental impact through utilizing more efficient software.

Intel's paper, Increasing Data Center Efficiency with Server Power Measurements (https://www.intel.com/content/dam/doc/white-paper/intel-it-data-center-efficiency-server-power-paper.pdf), gives an objective framework for understanding efficiency and data center costs. There are many factors, such as buildings, cooling systems, and computer system designs. Efficient building design, efficient cooling systems, and efficient computer systems (data center efficiency, data center density, and storage density) can lower costs and environmental impact. But you can destroy those gains by deploying an inefficient software stack compelling you to buy more servers than you would if you had an efficient software stack. Alternatively, you can amplify gains from data center efficiency with an efficient software stack that lets you decrease the number of servers required.

This talk about efficient software stacks isn't just for altruistic environmental purposes. This is one of those cases where being green can help your business bottom line.