Thomai Papadopoulou, Tom Jackson, Graham Hitchen, Michael Wilson, and Gyuchan Thomas Jun
According to the Paris Agreement in 2015, nations and organisations worldwide set some net zero targets and pledged to decrease their carbon emissions by 2050 or even sooner. Net zero means that the total emissions produced are equal to the total emissions removed from the atmosphere, and it is a crucial step towards coping with global warming. To accomplish that goal, all sectors should comply with decarbonisation measures, including the progressively expanding digital sector.
As they spread across every sector and support every activity, making the reliance on technology an integral part of people’s lives, digital technologies should be considered not only as a tool for decarbonisation, but also a potential contributor to carbon emissions production. The increase in the number of digital devices and the extended use of digital services during the past few decades has a negative environmental impact, including landfill pollution, extensive use of water, and CO2 emissions, also known as the digital carbon footprint. Digital Decarbonisation targets the mitigation of the digital carbon footprint.
This presentation aims to advance the understanding of the factors affecting the mitigation of the carbon emitted from the use of digital technologies. We conducted a literature review, which was analysed thematically to identify the tensions, dilemmas a in nd conflicting goals surrounding the mitigation of the digital carbon footprint, as well as the multiple stakeholders involved and the intricate relationships between them, that we then mapped using a Rich Picture. This presentation will end with highlighting the further need for employing systemic design to understand, analyse and unpack the digital ecosystem surrounding the digital decarbonisation.
Keywords: digital decarbonisation, digital carbon footprint, transition to net-zero, sociotechnical systems, systemic design, rich picture