Digital Technology Tackles Climate Change

How Computers Can Save the Planet

Jun 2, 2009 Brenda Ann Burke

The information technology industry is not known as environmentally friendly. But computer scientists are looking at ways to reduce harm and contribute to sustainability.

As the world becomes more aware of global warming and environmental challenges, experts are developing approaches both to reduce the carbon footprint of computer use, and to use digital technology positively to build energy-efficient societies.

In what ways are digital activities environmentally "dirty"? Computer hardware requires energy to produce and can become surplus to requirements fairly quickly. Data centres need a lot of power to heat and cool. Despite some shift in user practice, people still tend to leave their computers on, if on standby, when the machines are not needed.

The carbon footprint of internet searching is disputed, but a complex search that may last several minutes is estimated to generate between one and ten grams of carbon dioxide, according to Dr. Alexander Wissner-Gross from Harvard University. About 200 million internet searches are completed each day.

Greening IT Technology

Andy Hopper and Andrew Rice of Cambridge University recommend that the computer industry move to reusable and more durable components for hardware, coupled with shifts in practice such as users actually turning off items that are not in use. They also advocate moving data centres closer to sources of power, and perhaps using renewable energy such as on- or offshore windfarms or tidal power generators.

Hopper and Rice consider that the IT carbon footprint could be further reduced if people were accurately informed of how much power they were using for their various tasks and entertainment activities.

Cyberspace and Building Sustainable Economies

When digital technology was relatively new, some forecasters believed working from home would largely replace the daily commute to the office. That hasn't happened to the extent predicted. A key aspect of the IT-pollution debate is the extent to which computer use replaces, or can replace, more energy-intensive activities, such as driving cars.

Hopper and Rice remain optimistic about the extent to which physical activities which have an adverse effect on the environment can be replaced with digital alternatives. Electronic media, for example, is posing a real challenge to traditional newspapers and magazines, and doesn't need to be recycled. Hopper and Rice suggest that in future, "wealth creation and entertainment" may be pursued primarily through cyberspace.

They also point out the value of IT in devising solutions to environmental problems, for example in mapping buildings to identify those with the most heat loss, or predicting accurately the specific impacts of climate change.

Such approaches could either combine with, or be considered as alternatives to, initiatives by organisations such as Transition Towns, which focus on developing local alternatives to complex global economic systems.

The copyright of the article Digital Technology Tackles Climate Change in Environmentalism is owned by Brenda Ann Burke. Permission to republish Digital Technology Tackles Climate Change in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.

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