Digital ecology
Is the electronic technology sustainable? - Media Ecology Newsletter #22
How much carbon dioxide (CO2) is emitted by hitting the "like" button on a social network? How many non-renewable resources are consumed by watching a streaming movie? What ecological impact can the digitization of public administration have? Apparently, in those cases, there is just software at work, which in itself does not emit CO2. But beyond appearances, what happens is far from immaterial. There is the production of the devices and the consumption of nonrenewable resources, there is the mining of the rare-earths, the use of chemicals needed to make electronic tecnologies, and much more. There are the cables, the datacenters, the power plants. We often talk about the energy costs of blockchain, the infrastructure of electronic currencies like bitcoin. But there are 34 billion electronic devices on Earth - estimates Frédéric Bordage, for GreenIT - and their operation consumes 10 percent of the world's electricity. And since 35 percent of the energy used by computers comes from coal, it is estimated that digital is responsible for 4 percent of global CO2 emissions, about twice as much as aviation, according to a report by think tank The Shift Project. So what is the ecological footprint of digitization?
Guillaume Pitron has written a book about all this: L’enfer numérique. Voyage au bout d’un Like, Le liens qui Libèrent 2021. He has co-directed “The dark side of green energies” a documentary movie (2020). And he has previously written La guerre des métaux rates, Le liens qui Libèrent 2018.
Pitron’s book shows how - in the very long supply chains of the production of microprocessors, smartphones, servers, and cables - negative externalities take the form of CO2 emissions, but also many other types of pollution, while the consumption of water and electricity for datacenters is more worrying every day. Of course, the power production for datacenters is more and more based on renewable sources, but the strong growth the technology is demanding more and more power.
According to Ray Galvin, author of “The ICT/electronics question: Structural change and the rebound effect” a paper published by Ecological Economics, the savings in energy consumption made possible by technical advances in electronics are contributing to the increase in the use of electronics in more and more applications and for that reason increasing absolute energy consumption: in this run-up, according to Galvin, the overall increase in consumption could outpace the rate of increase in savings.
Steffen Lange, Johanna Pohl, Tilman Santarius have authored “Digitalization and energy consumption. Does ICT reduce energy demand?”, paper also published by Ecological Economics, in which they show the controversial contribution of digitalization on energy consumption.
The topic needs to be discussed. But it is clear that digital is far from immaterial. Its generating effect in emissions savings is probably positive. But the exponential growth of resources consumed by electronics should not be underestimated. The ecological balance sheet of digital is far from written. The way ahead is not to abandon digital, of course, but to accelerate the use of renewable sources for power generation. The digital transition can help the ecological transition, but only if an ecological transition will make digital technologies sustainable. (Nòva, Il Sole 24 Ore)
Welcome to the “media ecology” newsletter. After this note on the “digital ecology” issue, I share links that I consider strategic, hoping they are useful to readers.
Networks of brains
Are you interested like me in considering the media ecology as an environment for a network of neural networks to develop? In other words: do you like to consider the internet as a technological network that connects biological networks?
Here is a paper to think about:
Menardi A, Momi D, Vallesi A, Barabási Albert-Láó, Towlson EK, Santarnecchi E, “Maximizing brain networks engagement via individualized connectome-wide target search”, Brain Stimulation (2022), doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.brs.2022.09.011.
Small is vulnerable
Faustine Ngila, East Africa correspondent for Quartz Africa, writes about clone WhatsApp apps. And finds that they are particularly vulnerable to attacks. In fact, Kaspersky warned that a Trojan Horse by the name Triada is attacking clone WhatsApp apps such as YoWhatsApp (YoWa), WhatsAppGB and FMWhatsapp. These apps wowed millions in Africa and beyond with their expanded privacy features, custom fonts, bulk messaging, and the ability to transfer files of up to 700MBs, writes Ngila. But «Moscow-based cybersecurity firm Kaspersky has warned that a Trojan Horse by the name Triada, can penetrate into private messaging and take control of all smartphone services if the user is not using the legitimate WhatsApp app».
Chips of geopolitical discussions
Chris Miller has written Chip War, Scribner 2022 a super timely book about the fight for the core technology of the digital age. The cold conflict between the U.S. and China over control of microprocessor design and production is increasingly present in the international debate. Taiwan is at the center of everyone's sights. The Americans and Europeans are trying to bring production back away from the unstable Taiwanese location. But nothing in this complex environment appears easily achievable.
Podcasts in Italian, by me
L’altra metà del verso. Rai Radio 3
Media Ecology. Intesa Sanpaolo on air
Eppur s’innova. Luiss University Press
Ecology of screens
On the occasion of the International Conference Vivre par(mi) les écrans: entre passé et avenir, which was held in Lyon at the end of May, the newsletter of the International Research Group Vivre par(mi) les écrans and the Media Ecology newsletter agreed to signal, each to its recipients, the importance to them of the other's content, inviting them to subscribe to receive it and disseminate it among their contacts. So please visit Vivre par(mi) les écrans and subscribe to the newsletter.
This choice of collaboration stems from the common project of promoting, developing and sharing highly qualified knowledge aimed at creating tools for guidance, critique and intervention in the field of media ecology and our current and future living between(mite) screens, as well as fostering the social dissemination of the aforementioned knowledge and tools.
Follow the next Biennale Tecnologia, at Politecnico di Torino: November 10-13. Keynote speech by Nassim Taleb.