Green hardware comes up relatively frequently around here--energy efficient servers, laptops, etc. But this new concept makes a lot of sense: managing the data, not just the hardware, to be energy efficient.

Hence the Green Data Project. The tagline? "Green IT begins with Green Data."

Well, that may be taking it a bit far, but it makes a kind of sense. When you think about it, after all, what is on your computer? Mostly stuff you don't need and never look at, because--who knows?--maybe someday, someday you'll need that random document for legal reasons, or whatever.

You think your computer is bad? Think about the computers--or rather, servers--of entire companies. They must be (and, in fact, are--about 40 percent) full of stuff no one ever looks at. And running those servers uses energy.

So, the GDP, launched by The Data Management Institute and Archive Management (website down), wants to help companies re-file all that data to low-energy, archival hardware.

According to the press release published by the GDP, it's all free. The site looks pretty cool--just launched and a little bare of content, but we have our fingers crossed.

Thanks to PC Magazine's eco-blog, GoodCleanTech, for the story.