Is the Digital Future Sustainable?

Timo Seppälä, Juri Mattila and Risto Rajala

No 80, ETLA Brief from The Research Institute of the Finnish Economy

Abstract: Abstract It is predicted that in 2030, the energy consumption of the ICT sector will be 21% of the world’s energy consumption, but will resources be enough to carry out all the digital technology development trends at the same time? Trends, such as the transition to the ecommerce, the transition of mobile services to the fifth-generation network, video streaming, online gaming and the rise of electric cars, all increase the need for both storage and computing capacity and energy as well. More broadly, the geographical location of digital resources and infrastructures has implications to country’s security of supply, for example in systems of systems development of smart traffic. The ecological effects of digitalization should also be explored through the lens of digital ecology and sustainability.

Keywords: ICT; Energy efficiency; Computing capacity; Emissions trading; Security of supply (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O3 O33 Q4 Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 5 pages
Date: 2019-06-12
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ene, nep-env, nep-ict, nep-pay and nep-reg
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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