Intel, AMD, HP, and others met with fed officials recently to discuss how to reduce computer power use, the Wall Street Journal reports. Can rivals find common ground on what's looking like critical competitive turf?

The Journal story focuses on a Silicon Valley roundtable of industry execs led by Andy Karsner, an assistant secretary of the Department of Energy, to explore how they can collaborate on reducing power use in data centers. The Journal noted the oddity of Intel and AMD in the same room (the meeting was at AMD offices), and quoted Mr. Karsner as optimistic. Such cooperation has been edging forward much of this year. InformationWeek reported in April on an effort including AMD, HP, Sun, and IBM called GreenGrid.org to help companies design more energy-efficient data centers. EE Times reported that same month that Sun hosted a meeting with AMD, the EPA, and Lawrence Livermore Laboratories to discuss a standard to make energy comparisons easier, similar to the Energy Star found on appliances.

Coverage of this topic often emphasizes the feel-good side of this work—companies and government working together to tackle this social issue of energy conservation. What's underplayed is that this has become one of the single-biggest points of competition for chip- and server-makers. People are buying based on the cost to operate, and power and cooling expense can be up to 40% of a data centers' operating cost. InformationWeek ran an in-depth article in February on how companies are hitting their limits—of budget, space, and technology—when it comes to keeping their data centers cool. And we've written about the extreme methods vendors are testing for better cooling, from spray-on coolants to HP's plans to offer new computer-guided data-center refrigeration systems. Energy efficiency is a big part of how these companies plan to win.

So is there hope for much real cooperation on such a brutally competitive issue? The most likely prospect for progress is measurement standards—like the Energy Star system for appliances, an agreed-upon way for buyers to comparison shop on energy efficiency. The Journal cites that as a top priority of the EPA meetings, and likely to be hammered out over the next year. That sounds like the sort of thing highly competitive vendors can agree on. Then, let the sparks fly as they argue over whose product really performs best based on that standard.