Assessing GHG Benefits Induced by ICT Services in Practice: A Case Study and Resulting Challenges

Coroamă, Vlad C.; Höjer, Mattias

doi:10.2991/ict4s-16.2016.4

Cited by 7 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 11 publications

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“…As a result, there is a risk of increased use of generic data which in turn may add to contradicting results between LCAs [24]. Several data collection and calculation methods exist [5,11,32,33], which are known to be flawed [11,17,33,34] and the diverging usage of them could further increase the gap between the results, rendering them incomparable. Therefore, a better approach for measuring and collecting data in future studies needs to be identified.…”

Section: Challenge 2: Data Collection Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Life Cycle Assessment of Network Traffic: A Review of Challenges and Possible Solutions

2021

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The environmental impact of Industry 4.0 and related technologies remains relatively unknown, with little research devoted to investigating the impact on sustainability aspects, resulting in a greater need for climate reporting. However, impacts of data transmission have historically been the least studied part of the information and communication technology sector, and there is currently no consensus on how to correctly assess it. In an attempt to guide process development within the area in the hopes that future life cycle assessments will be created, this study sought to identify, examine, and address potential challenges that might occur when assessing the environmental impact of network traffic during its life cycle. Through a combination of a literature review and semi-systematic research interviews with identified experts within the field of research, several areas in the form of knowledge gaps, unsolved methodological issues, and areas in need of further development were identified and assessed. The results show that eight key challenges exist in the areas of system boundaries, data collection methods, energy intensity metrics, transparency and data availability, age of data, allocation procedures, assumptions, and limited coverage of impact categories. Several approaches to address said challenges are presented, as well as areas in need of further investigation. It is furthermore suggested that the sector should strive to agree upon several parameters of significance to enable future harmonized life cycle studies of network traffic.

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Section: Challenge 2: Data Collection Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Life Cycle Assessment of Network Traffic: A Review of Challenges and Possible Solutions

2021

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“…Or challenging the idea that smart equals sustainable (Rivera [50]) or questioning where we should put our effort (Pargman [78]). Or assumptions that ICT is solution (Zapico [61], Walker [32]) or the central part of the solution (von Heland [45], Gui [34]), that net effect of ICT4S is always positive (Batchelor [74], Coroama [75]), or that responding to climate change is relatively simple Shabajee [31], easily calculated (Hankel [77]) or merely providing information to change behaviour Cakici [76].…”

Section: Humility and Desire To Learn Over Fixed Knowledge Setsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Shifting the maturity needle of ICT for Sustainability

Mann¹,

Bates²,

Maher³

EPiC Series in Computing

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The ubiquity of ICT means the potential of ICT4S covers a broad range of sustainability topics and application domains. However, ICT4S research can be ill positioned with regard to the complexity of transforming society in such a way that people and environmental ecologies can coexist in a sustainable system. The danger is that ICT4S becomes partitioned into a small subset of sustainability and using a limited set of the levers at our disposal. Grounded in the Mann-Bates maturity scale for sustainability this paper performs an analysis of the ICT4S conference corpus to measure how mature the research is in our field with regard to sustainability. Based on this analysis we identify areas in which the ICT4S community can begin to shift the maturity of research in order to promote sustainable futures. By applying the Transformation Mindset our article demonstrates through a series of illustrative how ICT4S can apply this mindset to shift ICT4S research towards more sustainable trajectories. This is an essential first step in taking stock, highlighting shortcomings and identifying opportunities in ICT for sustainability.

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“…It may then be possible to estimate how much resources are saved indirectly by the push impacts. As the comparison baseline, however, is inherently hypothetical (i.e., how the world would have evolved without the pushed cleantech), any such estimate is subject to ontological uncertainty [38]. Further research is required to measure push impacts, as described below.…”

Section: Push Impacts Rebound and Technological Transitionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Digital Acceleration of Sustainability Transition: The Paradox of Push Impacts

Townsend

Coroamă

2018

Sustainability

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Sustainability requires ongoing reform of resource production and consumption to reduce environmental harms. The main way that Information and Communication Technology (ICT) can address these resource impacts is through digital optimization. Spreng found that optimization of an industrial process either increases energy use or accelerates production or consumption. It was assumed that reducing energy use progresses sustainability, whilst accelerating production or consumption to meet market demand is consumerist and generally detrimental to sustainability. In this paper, we argue that there are two important cases in which accelerating economic processes actually has an essential role in enabling sustainability by ICT: (1) when the process drives the production and adoption of an environmentally beneficial product such as a solar panel, often referred to as "cleantech", or (2) when the process being increased is specific to the Circular Economy, such as recycling, maintenance/refurbishment, and sharing/reuse e.g., car-sharing, ride-sharing and tool-sharing in the Sharing Economy. The opportunities for ICT4S optimization are thus threefold: not just saving resources with efficiency, but also pushing the adoption of cleantech, and pushing the circulation of resources.

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Assessing GHG Benefits Induced by ICT Services in Practice: A Case Study and Resulting Challenges

Cited by 7 publications

References 11 publications

Life Cycle Assessment of Network Traffic: A Review of Challenges and Possible Solutions

Life Cycle Assessment of Network Traffic: A Review of Challenges and Possible Solutions

Shifting the maturity needle of ICT for Sustainability

Digital Acceleration of Sustainability Transition: The Paradox of Push Impacts

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