Two reports from the Shift Project and the Green IT collective estimate that in 2019, digital technology represented around 4% of global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, with growth of almost 6% per year. At this level of impact, deleting our emails and cutting off our WiFi no longer seems sufficient in the face of the challenges, in this case a 5% reduction in emissions per year by 2050. Especially if we add to the emissions (which constitute 11% of the digital footprint in France) the impact on abiotic resources (52% of the digital footprint in France).
While environmental sustainability is of paramount bank data importance, social sustainability is equally important. In the midst of anticipating a wave of solastalgia, can the Metaverse save the world, like the island of Tuvalu that has just transposed itself into its virtual version to warn of rising sea levels? Could replacing resource-intensive physical goods and real-world experiences with digital and virtual alternatives in the Metaverse be the solution? Image generated by DALL-E Image generated by DALL-E In a recent conference, Le Hub France IA, for its part, discussed several avenues for responsible Artificial Intelligence around the ideas of reducing data size, improving quality, and above all pooling and free access to reason their exploitation.
IQM, the European leader in quantum computing, has also just raised 128 million euros to contribute to the fight against the climate crisis. But in the face of the crises that are shaking up the world and our societies, sobriety is essential: French MEP and economist Aurore Lalucq has just declared that "in times of war, energy must not be wasted on crypto assets. It must be used to heat ourselves, feed ourselves properly and maintain our European productive fabric. After having established these priorities, the question of mining is still very far down the list" .