Microsoft’s chief environmental strategist Rob Bernard has said that businesses must step up their efforts to become more energy efficient.

Bernard stressed on the need for behaviour change, saying that over 80% of IT professionals are not really addressing the issue to their potential.

He said, "They don’t actively monitor and drive energy reduction. The problem is behaviour change – not technology."

In an interview to the Guardian, Bernard said he wants to drive the efficiency gains he has made at Microsoft through the company’s network of partners and the wider IT sector.

Bernard urged the IT industry to look at efficiency in data centres.

He said, "Most data centres are operating at a power utilisation efficiency of 2.0, which means that for every two electrons that come into a building only one goes to computation – the other one goes to the air conditioning and the lights. We’ve already got our buildings down to 1.12. We’ve got to drive the whole industry way down on that 2.0."