How to find which columns don't have any data (all values are NULL)?

For a single column, count(ColumnName) returns the number of rows where ColumName is not null:

select  count(TheColumn)
from    YourTable

You can generate a query for all columns. Per Martin's suggestion, you can exclude columns that cannot be null with is_nullable = 1. For example:

select  'count(' + name + ') as ' + name + ', '
from    sys.columns
where   object_id = object_id('YourTable')
        and is_nullable = 1

If the number of tables is large, you can generate a query for all tables in a similiar way. The list of all tables is in sys.tables.

Here's a script I wrote to do the same thing, it's a two-step manual process:

1. Run this script in SSMS and select all of the rows in the Results pane:

SELECT
'SELECT
    COUNT( DISTINCT [' + COLUMN_NAME + ']) AS UniqueValues,
    ''' + TABLE_NAME + '.' + COLUMN_NAME + ''' AS ColumnName
FROM
    [' + TABLE_SCHEMA + '].[' + TABLE_NAME + ']

UNION ALL
'
FROM
    INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS
ORDER BY
    TABLE_NAME,
    COLUMN_NAME

2. Paste the results into a new query window. Scroll to the very bottom and remove the trailing UNION ALL statement. It will look like this:

SELECT   COUNT( DISTINCT [ModifiedByUserId]) AS UniqueValues,   'Inspections.ModifiedByUserId' AS ColumnName  FROM   [dbo].[Inspections]     UNION ALL  
SELECT   COUNT( DISTINCT [Notes]) AS UniqueValues,   'Inspections.Notes' AS ColumnName  FROM   [dbo].[Inspections]     UNION ALL  
SELECT   COUNT( DISTINCT [PublicPassword]) AS UniqueValues,   'Inspections.PublicPassword' AS ColumnName  FROM   [dbo].[Inspections]     UNION ALL  
SELECT   COUNT( DISTINCT [ShopId]) AS UniqueValues,   'Inspections.ShopId' AS ColumnName  FROM   [dbo].[Inspections]     UNION ALL  
SELECT   COUNT( DISTINCT [Status]) AS UniqueValues,   'Inspections.Status' AS ColumnName  FROM   [dbo].[Inspections]     UNION ALL  
SELECT   COUNT( DISTINCT [SupervisorUserId]) AS UniqueValues,   'Inspections.SupervisorUserId' AS ColumnName  FROM   [dbo].[Inspections]     UNION ALL  

3. Run the query. It took about 6 minutes to run on a 300-column database. It will be faster or slow depending on how many indexes are being used.

Updated....Okay I had way too much fun with this

THe Proc accepts two parameters, the table to search & the Criteria to apply. you can pass essentially and where clause to the second parameter. I wrote the proc to interpret double quotes back to single quotes....again this was built off of the original developers concepts.

GO
/****** Object:  StoredProcedure [dbo].[SearchAllTables]    Script Date: 05/04/2011 14:29:48 ******/
SET ANSI_NULLS ON
GO
SET QUOTED_IDENTIFIER ON
GO
alter PROC [dbo].[SearchAllTables2] ( @SEARCH_TABLE NVARCHAR(255), @CONDITION AS NVARCHAR(MAX) ) AS
BEGIN

-- Copyright © 2002 Narayana Vyas Kondreddi. All rights reserved.
-- Purpose: To search all columns of all tables for a given search string
-- Written by: Narayana Vyas Kondreddi -- Site: http://vyaskn.tripod.com
-- Tested on: SQL Server 7.0 and SQL Server 2000
-- Date modified: 28th July 2002 22:50 GMT
CREATE TABLE #Results (ColumnName nvarchar(370), ColumnValue nvarchar(3630))
SET NOCOUNT ON
DECLARE @TableName nvarchar(256), @ColumnName nvarchar(128), @SearchStr2 nvarchar(110), @COND_STR NVARCHAR(MAX)
SET @TableName = '' 
--SET @SearchStr2 = QUOTENAME('%' + @SearchStr + '%','''')
WHILE @TableName IS NOT NULL
BEGIN
SET @ColumnName = ''
SET @CONDITION = REPLACE(@CONDITION,'"','''')
SET @TableName =
(
SELECT MIN(QUOTENAME(TABLE_SCHEMA) + '.' + QUOTENAME(TABLE_NAME))
FROM INFORMATION_SCHEMA.TABLES
WHERE
TABLE_TYPE = 'BASE TABLE'
AND
QUOTENAME(TABLE_SCHEMA) + '.' + QUOTENAME(TABLE_NAME) > @TableName
AND OBJECTPROPERTY(
OBJECT_ID(
QUOTENAME(TABLE_SCHEMA) + '.' + QUOTENAME(TABLE_NAME)
), 'IsMSShipped'
) = 0 AND TABLE_NAME = @SEARCH_TABLE
) WHILE (@TableName IS NOT NULL) AND (@ColumnName IS NOT NULL) 
BEGIN SET @ColumnName = ( 
SELECT MIN(QUOTENAME(COLUMN_NAME)) 
FROM INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS 
WHERE TABLE_SCHEMA = PARSENAME(@TableName, 2) AND 
TABLE_NAME = PARSENAME(@TableName, 1) AND QUOTENAME(COLUMN_NAME) > @ColumnName ) 
IF @ColumnName IS NOT NULL 
BEGIN 
SET @COND_STR = REPLACE(@CONDITION,'''','"')
INSERT INTO #Results 
EXEC ( 'SELECT  DISTINCT ''' + @TableName + '.' + @ColumnName + ''',''' + @COND_STR + ''' AS CONDITION FROM ' + @TableName + ' (NOLOCK) ' + ' WHERE ' + @ColumnName + ' ' + @CONDITION)
PRINT ( 'SELECT  DISTINCT ''' + @TableName + '.' + @ColumnName + ''',''' + @COND_STR + ''' AS CONDITION FROM ' + @TableName + ' (NOLOCK) ' + ' WHERE ' + @ColumnName + ' ' + @CONDITION)
END 
END 
END 
    SELECT ColumnName, ColumnValue 
    FROM #Results 
END
GO
-- to execute

exec [SearchAllTables2] 'TABLENAME','LIKE "%DOUG%"' -- double quotes are automatically escaped to single quotes...

Original code modified from copyright below....only using portions.

GO
/****** Object:  StoredProcedure [dbo].[SearchAllTables]    Script Date: 05/04/2011 14:29:48 ******/
SET ANSI_NULLS ON
GO
SET QUOTED_IDENTIFIER ON
GO
alter PROC [dbo].[SearchAllTables2] ( @TABLE_NAME NVARCHAR(255) ) AS
BEGIN

-- Copyright © 2002 Narayana Vyas Kondreddi. All rights reserved.
-- Purpose: To search all columns of all tables for a given search string
-- Written by: Narayana Vyas Kondreddi -- Site: http://vyaskn.tripod.com
-- Tested on: SQL Server 7.0 and SQL Server 2000
-- Date modified: 28th July 2002 22:50 GMT
CREATE TABLE #Results (ColumnName nvarchar(370), ColumnValue nvarchar(3630))
SET NOCOUNT ON
DECLARE @TableName nvarchar(256), @ColumnName nvarchar(128), @SearchStr2 nvarchar(110)
SET @TableName = '' 
--SET @SearchStr2 = QUOTENAME('%' + @SearchStr + '%','''')
WHILE @TableName IS NOT NULL
BEGIN
SET @ColumnName = ''
SET @TableName =
(
SELECT MIN(QUOTENAME(TABLE_SCHEMA) + '.' + QUOTENAME(TABLE_NAME))
FROM INFORMATION_SCHEMA.TABLES
WHERE
TABLE_TYPE = 'BASE TABLE'
AND
QUOTENAME(TABLE_SCHEMA) + '.' + QUOTENAME(TABLE_NAME) > @TableName
AND OBJECTPROPERTY(
OBJECT_ID(
QUOTENAME(TABLE_SCHEMA) + '.' + QUOTENAME(TABLE_NAME)
), 'IsMSShipped'
) = 0 AND TABLE_NAME = @TABLE_NAME
) WHILE (@TableName IS NOT NULL) AND (@ColumnName IS NOT NULL) 
BEGIN SET @ColumnName = ( 
SELECT MIN(QUOTENAME(COLUMN_NAME)) 
FROM INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS 
WHERE TABLE_SCHEMA = PARSENAME(@TableName, 2) AND 
TABLE_NAME = PARSENAME(@TableName, 1) AND QUOTENAME(COLUMN_NAME) > @ColumnName ) 
IF @ColumnName IS NOT NULL 
BEGIN 
INSERT INTO #Results 
EXEC ( 'SELECT  DISTINCT ''' + @TableName + '.' + @ColumnName + ''', ''IS NULL'' FROM ' + @TableName + ' (NOLOCK) ' + ' WHERE ' + @ColumnName + ' IS NULL ')--LIKE ' + @SearchStr2 ) 
--PRINT ( 'SELECT  DISTINCT ''' + @TableName + '.' + @ColumnName + ''', ''IS NOT NULL'' FROM ' + @TableName + ' (NOLOCK) ' + ' WHERE  ' + @ColumnName + ' IS NOT NULL ')--LIKE ' + @SearchStr2 ) 
END 
END 
END 
    SELECT ColumnName, ColumnValue 
    FROM #Results 
END
GO
-- to execute

exec [SearchAllTables2] 'Master'