Cloud Resource Analyzer

Overview

This skill scans cloud provider accounts for resources that are costing money but providing no value — orphaned storage volumes, stale snapshots, unattached elastic IPs, idle load balancers, and oversized databases. It produces a prioritized cleanup report with estimated savings and safe deletion scripts. The examples use AWS CLI v2; GCP and Azure need the equivalent gcloud and az queries.

Instructions

Step 1: Determine Cloud Provider and Access

Check which CLI tools are available and configured:

aws sts get-caller-identity 2>/dev/null && echo "AWS: configured"
gcloud config get-value project 2>/dev/null && echo "GCP: configured"
az account show 2>/dev/null && echo "Azure: configured"

Scan every region that has resources, not only the default one. List them with aws ec2 describe-regions (add --all-regions to the filter only if opt-in regions are in use).

Step 2: Scan for Orphaned Storage (AWS Example)

# Unattached EBS volumes (status "available" = not attached to any instance)
aws ec2 describe-volumes --filters Name=status,Values=available \
  --query 'Volumes[].{ID:VolumeId,Size:Size,Type:VolumeType,Created:CreateTime,Tags:Tags}' \
  --output json

# Snapshots older than 90 days (cutoff computed at run time, so the query never goes stale)
# GNU date shown; on macOS use: date -u -v-90d +%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%SZ
CUTOFF=$(date -u -d '90 days ago' +%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%SZ)
aws ec2 describe-snapshots --owner-ids self \
  --query "Snapshots[?StartTime<=\`\"$CUTOFF\"\`].{ID:SnapshotId,Size:VolumeSize,Start:StartTime,Desc:Description}" \
  --output json

# Snapshots that an AMI still depends on cannot be deleted; list them so they are excluded
aws ec2 describe-images --owners self \
  --query 'Images[].BlockDeviceMappings[].Ebs.SnapshotId' --output text

# Unassociated Elastic IPs (AssociationId is null when the address is idle)
aws ec2 describe-addresses --query 'Addresses[?AssociationId==null].{IP:PublicIp,AllocID:AllocationId}' \
  --output json

Step 3: Scan for Idle Compute and Network

# List target groups, then check each one for unhealthy targets
aws elbv2 describe-target-groups \
  --query 'TargetGroups[].{Name:TargetGroupName,ARN:TargetGroupArn}' --output table

aws elbv2 describe-target-health \
  --target-group-arn arn:aws:elasticloadbalancing:us-east-1:418273906541:targetgroup/checkout-api/3f2a9c1d8e7b6a50 \
  --query 'TargetHealthDescriptions[?TargetHealth.State!=`healthy`]'

# RDS instance with average CPU over 14 days (GNU date; macOS: date -u -v-14d)
START=$(date -u -d '14 days ago' +%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%SZ)
END=$(date -u +%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%SZ)
aws cloudwatch get-metric-statistics --namespace AWS/RDS \
  --metric-name CPUUtilization --period 86400 --statistics Average \
  --start-time "$START" --end-time "$END" \
  --dimensions Name=DBInstanceIdentifier,Value=orders-db-prod

A low average CPU is a candidate, not a verdict. Check connections, IOPS and memory before recommending a smaller class.

Step 4: Calculate Costs

Use these list prices (US East, on-demand) for estimates. Use a 720-hour month. Confirm your region's prices in the AWS Pricing Calculator before reporting totals:

• EBS gp3: $0.08/GB-month; gp2: $0.10/GB-month
• EBS snapshots (standard): $0.05/GB-month
• Public IPv4 address, in use or idle: $0.005/hour, about $3.60/month. An unattached Elastic IP is charged the same way.
• Application Load Balancer: $0.0225/hour (about $16.20/month) plus per-LCU charges
• Network Load Balancer: $0.0225/hour (about $16.20/month) plus per-NLCU charges. The base price is not $6.75.
• NAT Gateway: $0.045/hour per AZ (about $32.40/month) plus per-GB processing. The figure is taken from the AWS example, so check your region.

RDS instance and S3 storage prices vary by engine, class and region. Look them up rather than reusing a remembered number.

Step 5: Generate Cleanup Report

Organize findings by category with estimated monthly cost. Sort by savings descending. Include:

• Resource ID, type, region
• Creation date and relevant tags
• Why it's considered orphaned/idle
• Estimated monthly cost
• Recommended action (delete, downsize, archive)

Step 6: Create Safe Cleanup Scripts

Generate scripts with:

• --dry-run flag that only lists what would be deleted
• Tag-based grace period (tag resources scheduled-for-deletion: <date+7d>)
• Snapshot before delete for EBS volumes
• Confirmation prompts for production resources

Examples

Example 1: Full AWS Audit

User prompt:

Scan our AWS account for wasted cloud resources

Agent output:

Cloud Resource Audit — AWS account 418273906541
Region: us-east-1
────────────────────────────────────────────────

STORAGE WASTE
  Unattached EBS volumes: 4 volumes, 450 GiB total          $36.00/mo
  Snapshots older than 90 days (no AMI): 23, 1,200 GiB      $60.00/mo

NETWORK WASTE
  Unassociated Elastic IPs: 2                                $7.20/mo
  ALB with 0 healthy targets: 1                             $16.20/mo
  NAT Gateway with <1 GB/mo traffic: 1                      $32.40/mo

NOT PRICED (look up in Pricing Calculator)
  RDS orders-db-prod: 3% avg CPU over 14 days, db.r5.xlarge
    → candidate for downsizing after checking connections and memory
  S3 buckets with no recent access: 2 buckets, 340 GiB
    → confirm with S3 Storage Lens or server access logs first

Total priced waste: $151.90/mo ($1,823/year)

Example 2: Targeted EBS Cleanup

User prompt:

Find and clean up orphaned EBS volumes in us-west-2

Agent output:

Found 3 unattached EBS volumes in us-west-2:

vol-0abc123  200Gi gp3  Created: 2025-05-12  Tag: postgres-backup    $16.00/mo
vol-0def456  100Gi gp3  Created: 2025-08-30  Tag: jenkins-workspace  $8.00/mo
vol-0ghi789   50Gi gp2  Created: 2025-10-15  Tag: none               $5.00/mo

Cleanup script generated: cleanup-ebs-us-west-2.sh
  ./cleanup-ebs-us-west-2.sh --dry-run    # Preview only
  ./cleanup-ebs-us-west-2.sh --execute    # Tag for deletion in 7 days
  ./cleanup-ebs-us-west-2.sh --force      # Delete immediately (creates snapshots first)

Guidelines

• Read-only by default — never delete resources without explicit user confirmation
• Grace period pattern — always recommend tagging resources for deletion before actually deleting
• Snapshot before delete — for EBS volumes, always create a snapshot before removal
• AMI dependency — a snapshot referenced by an AMI cannot be deleted; deregister the AMI first, and only with the owner's approval
• Cross-reference dependencies — check if volumes are referenced by Terraform state, K8s PVCs, or backup policies before flagging
• Multi-region — remind users to scan all active regions, not just the default
• Cost estimates are approximate — based on on-demand list prices; reserved instances, savings plans and free tiers may change the real bill
• Sensitive data — warn about volumes that might contain database data or secrets
• Idle is not unused — low CPU or zero traffic can still mean a standby, a DR copy or a quarterly job; ask the owner before tagging