While cloud computing energy consumption is a source of debate, according to a post by Joe McKendrick, moving business to the shared pool of the cloud could be an energy saver.

A report this summer by the Carbon Disclosure Project by AT&T finds that companies that adopt cloud computing can reduce their energy consumption, lower carbon emissions and decrease capital expenditure. Companies can do all of this while improving operation efficiency, and the group estimates that by 2020, large U.S. companies that use cloud computing can have an annual savings of $12.3 billion.

"As a result of our move to an online economy, it’s possible that we’re saving more resources than we give ourselves credit for," McKendrick said. "As many businesses are now digital, and operate virtually versus physically, there’s a potentially a significant degree of resource consumption that no longer takes place, that hasn’t been tracked. Perhaps, we’ll realize, for every kWh computers and data centers consume, they give back x number of kWhs."

He said that energy consumption of cloud services does need to be managed well, but he said it would be worth it to examine the hidden green benefits of companies switching over to cloud computing solutions.