Introduction

CATS is a Climate-Aware Task Scheduler. It schedules cluster jobs to minimize predicted carbon intensity of running the process.

Summary

The Climate-Aware Task Scheduler is a lightweight Python package designed to schedule tasks based on the estimated carbon intensity of the electricity grid at any given moment.

This tool uses real-time carbon intensity data from the National Grid ESO via their API to estimate the carbon intensity of the electricity grid, and schedules tasks at times when the estimated carbon intensity is lowest. This helps to reduce the carbon emissions associated with running computationally intensive tasks, making it an ideal solution for environmentally-conscious developers.

Scope

Currently CATS only works in the UK. If you are aware of APIs for realtime grid carbon intensity data in other countries, please open an issue to let us know.

Background

It was created as part of the Software Sustainability Institute’s Collaborations Workshop 2023 Hack Day.

Features

  • Estimates the carbon intensity of the electricity grid in real-time

  • Schedules tasks based on the estimated carbon intensity, minimizing carbon emissions

  • Provides a simple and intuitive API for developers

  • Lightweight and easy to integrate into existing workflows

  • Supports Python 3.9+