Microsoft Cloud for Sustainability will be available in June 2022

Microsoft has confirmed that its Sustainability-Focused Software Package (SaaS), designed to help businesses reduce their environmental footprint, will be publicly available from June 1, 2022.

Known as Microsoft Cloud for Sustainability, the product suite provides businesses with the ability to capture and analyze cloud-based data that will allow them to collect and report their real-time emissions data more easily and use that information, to make changes in the way they work. .

“Microsoft Cloud for Sustainability enables users not only to set industry-specific sustainability goals, but to provide effective insights and reduction strategies to accelerate their journey to sustainability,” the documentation said.

The setup is designed so that users can see their company’s overall footprint and store it centrally in a common format, according to Microsoft’s product documentation, which also identifies a range of uses for the technology.

For example, Microsoft Cloud for Sustainability could be used by CIOs who want information on total carbon emissions generated by the use of the cloud, end-user devices and other applications, Microsoft said.

It could also allow companies to provide their customers with a sustainability map that tracks their progress in limiting their carbon emissions, Microsoft added.

“Microsoft Cloud for Sustainability allows any organization to more easily and efficiently record, report, reduce and replace its emissions,” the documentation concludes.

Microsoft has announced a public visualization of its cloud-based sustainability toolkit in late October 2021 to coincide with the start date of the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) in Glasgow, Scotland.

After more than six months of further changes and development, the proposal will be publicly available on June 1, 2022, the company confirmed in a blog post, co-authored by Alice Taylor, corporate vice president of industrial applications and data marketing; and Elizabeth Brinton, Microsoft’s corporate vice president of sustainability.

“To effectively manage sustainability reporting, sustainability efforts and business transformation, organizations need better visibility of their businesses and value chain,” they wrote.

“The collection and connection of Internet of Things (IoT) data from sensor devices – combined with rich peripheral or cloud services – provides the basis for monitoring and measuring scale-up activities.

The blog post also presents Microsoft’s sustainability cloud as part of the software giant’s growing portfolio of environmental, social and managerial (ESG) capabilities, as well as further evidence of its commitment to climate change.

As previously reported by Computer Weekly, Microsoft outlined plans in January 2020 to become a carbon-negative company by 2030 and a few months later went public with its promise to become a positive-water company by 2030.

“Our own journey to sustainability began when we set our first carbon goal more than a decade ago. This has led us to better organize our data and align our company’s vision and strategy with our sustainability goals, ”the blog post continues.

“We continue to build on our commitment to innovate and invest in technologies aimed at environmental sustainability and to transparently share our achievements and failures so that we can all learn together.