Environmental impact of ICTs

The intangibility of the Internet brings forth the challenge of connecting the mobilization and transformation of intangible resources, with tangible environmental impacts.^[1]

Areas of impact[edit | edit source]

Electronics[edit | edit source]

• Resource extraction: the production of devices requires the Some examples are lithium, cobalt,^[2] and rare earth minerals.
• Production of devices:
• Electronics disposal:
• Datacenters operation: great amounts of water are used for cooling servers, depleting in many cases resources from local communities.^[3]

Land use[edit | edit source]

• Location of data centers in colder regions and near superficial or underground water bodies.

Energy[edit | edit source]

• Data storage
• Computing power in resource-intensive processes such as artificial intelligence and the mining of crypto assets. For example,<ref name="cambridge-crypto">Hileman, G., & Rauchs, M. (2017). Global Cryptocurrency Benchmark Study. https://www.jbs.cam.ac.uk/faculty-research/centres/alternative-finance/publications/global-cryptocurrency/<ref>== Measuring impact ==

There is a difficulty in the creation of models for measuring the environmental impact of ICTs.

• Lack of comparable data.
• Lack of measurements or even secrecy regarding the tangible impacts of physical data centers in terms of energy usage, and resource extractions.
• There is no roadmap to more sustainable practices.

Initiatives[edit | edit source]

• Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index (CBECI)<ref name="cambridge">Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance. (n.d.). Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index (CBECI). Retrieved April 8, 2022, from https://ccaf.io/cbeci/mining_map<ref>== Actions ==

References[edit | edit source]