The Interior Department's National Business Center has expanded the cloud computing services it is offering federal agencies by including cloud-delivered software applications.

The Obama administration is encouraging agencies to save money by adopting cloud computing, where agencies rent access to servers, storage, software and applications over the Internet, rather than owning and maintaining those servers and systems themselves.

The National Business Center announced its new cloud-delivered software services in a Feb. 27 news release. These expand upon its infrastructure and application offerings that were announced in November.

The center offers a private cloud for federal agencies with access to a pool of networks, storage, services and desktop applications. The center's cloud is a National Institute of Standards of Technology-certified secure federal environment.