Venue & Date
https://gdrgpl2024.sciencesconf.org/program
Slides:
https://gdrgpl2024.sciencesconf.org/data/program/Maraninchi_2.pdf
Abstract
Research in computer science and computer engineering includes several
branches dedicated to the environmental impacts of ICT. Green-ICT
consists in improving the performances of ICT itself (software,
hardware, communication infrastruture) in order to reduce its impacts;
Green-by-ICT promises to reduce the impacts of other sectors thanks to
ICT. In this talk we will argue that this is not sufficient. Green-ICT
optimizations are often (if not always) synonymous of massive rebound
effects. Green-by-ICT is nothing more than a promise, at least until
now. Moreover there are intrinsic anti-limits in the design principles
that make it difficult, if not impossible, to stay within planetary
limits. We should start studying other, less techno-optimistic,
scenarios. A somewhat extreme hypothesis is that manufacturing new
hardware will stop at some point in the future. We should therefore
study the “fading-ICT” scenario, using the abundant ICT resources of
today to prepare a future of scarcity.