As part of its goal to be the world's greenest tech company, Dell announced yesterday that its newest server power supply will be the first to meet the 80-Plus certification's gold standard, putting the company well ahead of its commitments to the Climate Savers Computing Initiative and Energy Star requirements.

Reaching 80-Plus Gold certification means that the power supply is at least 92 percent efficient at 50 percent output; lower levels of certification require between 85 and 88 percent efficiency at that amount of output.

By hitting this mark so early, Dell said it was a year in advance of its commitments to the Climate Savers Computing Initiative, which requires member organizations to design 40 percent of their servers to be at least 89 percent efficient by July 2009. Dell is also out in front of the Energy Star 5.0 requirements, which also go into effect July '09 and will require 80-Plus certification for power supplies.

The Gold certification is only the latest in energy efficiency developments from Dell. Earlier this month, the company announced it had developed an 80-Plus Silver power supply for its desktop units, and released an energy efficient desktop aimed at small businesses.