Is Sustainable IT an oxymoron? “Deafening silence”, “economic forecast”, “military intelligence” - these phrases are familiar oxymorons, a term for a figure of speech in which seemingly contradictory terms appear together. You can find long lists of similar terms very quickly using your favourite search engine. “Sustainable information technology” doesn’t seem to appear in any of them - but I think that it should - at least for the time-being…
Do you have the energy? Energy is always going to be a problem when it comes to a discussion about sustainable information technology. I recently read an article on Dan Luu’s blog about the siting of power stations. The story was about the disparity between the cost of computing hardware (servers) and the cost of powering and cooling said hardware. But it also highlights how the changing economy (from industrial to knowledge) has an impact on energy generation.
Greening the IT Supply Chain One of the biggest levers that businesses have in promoting sustainability is by lobbying the companies that supply stuff to them. If a supplier is unable or unwilling to provide evidence of sustainable practices, or improving sustainability in their organisation, then a business should find a supplier who can do this. As businesses add sustainability credentials as criteria for their purchase decisions, the market will promote suppliers who provide these credentials.