Microsoft chief environmental strategist Rob Bernard with his Windows 7 notebook. Business Journal photos by Stephen Brashear

Microsoft's environmental impact isn’t limited to its massive data centers or its commuting employees. With hundreds of millions of PCs draining batteries and tapping into power outlets around the world, even a small tweak in Microsoft Windows can influence global energy consumption.

One study estimated that changes in Windows Vista — mostly changes in the operating system’s “sleep” mode — could benefit the environment in the U.S. as much as taking 380,000 cars off the road.

Which explains why the next version of the program, Windows 7, is such a big focus for Rob Bernard, the company’s chief environmental strategist. Bernard and his team have been working with Windows developers and managers to help incorporate new energy-saving approaches into the operating system — and to figure out how to get companies and consumers to use them.

Windows 7 developers made a series of changes with the goal of reducing the power consumed by PCs — including tweaking the way Windows works with displays, adding new tools for managing energy consumption, and changing the way the operating system runs different services in the background.

Philosophically and strategically, Microsoft’s focus on energy efficiency in Windows 7 has been “much more significant” than in previous versions of the operating system, Bernard said. The company has put a greater emphasis on producing research papers about the changes. And it has started working with hardware makers and other industry partners on energy issues much earlier in the development cycle.

Changes are designed to make computers more energy efficient not only when they’re being used but when they’re idle.

Bernard said the push for energy efficiency will continue after the Oct. 22 launch of the Windows 7 operating system, as Microsoft works to get people in the industry to take advantage of the changes.

“It’s really about how we bring our whole partner ecosystem and IT professionals into the discussion and get them to leverage what we’ve already built,” Bernard said.

One big focus was on cutting the energy consumed by computer displays, which account for a big slice of the power used by the overall system — as much as 40 percent on mobile computers, for example.

“The major energy use right now is from the monitors themselves,” said Nick Zigelbaum, an energy analyst at the Natural Resources Defense Council. “They’ve gotten much more efficient, but the No. 1 way to save energy is just to have robust auto-sleep or auto power-down features.”

In Windows Vista, Microsoft addressed the issue in part by activating power-management features by default, including a mechanism to shift a computer into sleep mode when it wasn’t being used. After Windows Vista’s January 2007 release, the NRDC estimated that the Windows Vista changes could save as much as $50 a year in energy costs for every desktop computer.

Windows 7 looks to build upon those changes with an Adaptive Display Brightness feature that automatically dims the display after a specified period of inactivity, bringing it back to standard brightness when the user presses a key or moves the mouse. Windows 7 also supports ambient light sensors in PCs to automatically dim or brighten the display depending on the intensity of the surrounding light.

Microsoft also has taken steps to make Windows itself more efficient. In the past, for example, some services inside the operating system would run in the background even if they weren’t being used. Microsoft will seek to cut down on that effect in Windows 7 by instead “trigger starting” many of the operating system’s internal services, to make sure they’re running only when needed.

Microsoft cites the example of Windows 7’s service for connecting PCs to Bluetooth wireless devices, which kicks in only when a Bluetooth device is being used in conjunction with the computer.

Another technique in Windows 7, known as “timer coalescing,” can coordinate background services to launch at the same time, rather than on their own. That lets the computer processor remain idle for longer periods of time. It’s similar to giving a wheelbarrow a bigger load, rather than taking multiple trips.

Windows 7 also includes an energy diagnostic tool for information-technology staffers that monitors a machine for a specified period of time – 60 seconds, by default – and produces a report that details potential problems. Those problems could be a buggy device driver that doesn’t let the computer go into sleep mode, for instance, or an application that causes the processor to run faster than it should.

With that information, the IT staff can then talk to an internal application developer or a device manufacturer to resolve the problem, said Jason Leznek, group project manager for Windows 7.

End users of the operating system can also use the Windows 7 Troubleshooting Platform in the control panel to diagnose energy usage problems. For example, if the computer battery is draining more quickly than it should, the tool might suggest switching to a more energy-efficient power setting.

“It’s just a lot easier, and a lot more approachable for people to use," Leznek said.

Microsoft hasn’t yet released data to quantify the potential environmental impact of the Windows 7 energy management changes. Purely anecdotally, Bernard says he has noticed as much as a 20 percent increase in the battery life on his notebook computer after upgrading to the new operating system.

In addition, the effect of Windows 7’s launch could be magnified because many companies and consumers avoided Windows Vista after it experienced initial hardware and software compatibility problems. That means many people will be making the switch from Windows XP, which was launched in 2001, before energy efficiency was such a big focus for the company.

CHECKING UP ON ROB BERNARD, PART III: Approaching the end of his second year as Microsoft’s chief environmental strategist, Rob Bernard says the company is pressing forward with many of the plans it conceived during his first year in the role.

“We’ve moved from thinking about environmental sustainability to acting broadly on it,” Bernard said, citing examples including the launch of the company’s new “Hohm” energy service and a new emphasis on environmental initiatives in the company’s field offices.

Under a program called 20/10 for 2010, Microsoft has given each field office a goal of reducing its travel by 20 percent, and reaching a 10 percent improvement in energy efficiency in its offices by next year.

Not everyone is convinced Microsoft is doing enough. Greenpeace in May gave Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer a score of 7 — out of 100 — in a report card on the environmental track records of top technology executives. Ballmer was taken to task for not speaking out more on the environment, although did he rank above Sony’s Howard Stringer, Sharp’s Katsuhiko Machida and Toshiba’s Atsutoshi Nishida.

But Bernard cites a wide range of areas where the company is pressing ahead, including the opening of more energy-efficient data centers in Illinois and Ireland. Hohm, an online consumer energy-management service that Microsoft announced in June, has so far exceeded the company’s expectations, Bernard said. He declined to provide specific numbers about consumer usage.

On another front, the head of Microsoft’s enterprise and partner group, Simon Witts, recently stressed the importance of environmental efforts in an address to employees at the company’s “MGX” global sales meeting. And at Microsoft Research’s recent Faculty Summit with university researchers in Redmond, there was a special series of sessions on the environment and the potential uses of technology to address environmental challenges.

In addition, the company has started a pilot program to designate “sustainability captains” who will pay attention to environmental issues and alert managers to problems and possible solutions in the company’s operations.

For the record, Bernard is still driving his 2001 Volvo, based on his determination that the environmental cost of producing a new car would outweigh the environmental savings of giving up his older, less energy-efficient car. He acknowledged that the federal government’s “Cash for Clunkers” program did make him think about the issue again, but it wasn’t enough to sway him.