ICT & Environment – Supply & Demand Considerations

OECD Working Party on the Information Economy released “Measuring the Relationship Between ICT and the Environment” (2009).  The report contains a useful framework for asking important questions from supply (producer) and demand (in use) perspectives concerning positive and negative environmental impacts (click on diagram to see larger version).

Impact of Computers on the Environment

Most of my blog is about how information systems can enhance and transform environmental sustainability throughout the enterprise. It’s about using the Internet, PCs,  iPhone apps., carbon tracking software, information visualization, etc., to green organizations and improve the natural environment. 
Computers themselves, however, have an impact on the environment in terms of energy use, disposal, etc. A volume [...]

ICTs and Climate Change: Global Symposia

Two 2008 international symposia (in Kyoto and London) focused on ICTs and Climate change. Some tidbits:

Climate change: ICTs to the rescue? 
ICTs as a clean technology
Towards a high bandwidth, low carbon future 
What kind of targets might be established for the reduction in GHG through the use of ICTs?
What contribution to this could be made by the implementaion of relevant ITU Treaties and ITU recommendations?

Stimulus Bill

Green Technology: $65 billion
Energy efficient servers: $50 million (.08%) [Green IT]
Smart electricity grid: $4.5 billion (6.9%) [IT for greening other activities]

More $ is going toward IT that creates cascade effects, such as providing a platform for energy management software to shame consumers into using less promote conservation. Less is allocated to stimulating server demand [...]

More Silicon, Less Carbon – More Cowbell!

Marisa at CSR@Intel posted some useful studies on IT and climate change.
A linked article in December’s Economist sums up the argument as follows:
So computing does indeed have a role in fighting climate change, but that role mainly involves using computers in new ways, rather than making the machines themselves more efficient. It is time [...]

Green IT @ Sun

Mark Monroe, Director of Sustainable Computing at Sun, talks about green products and services in this podcast. About halfway in, Mark discusses power management software, and the need to start thinking about things like whether an email server really needs to be operating at full capacity 24X7. Another interesting thread is about customer awareness of [...]