Video conferencing instead of short-haul flights, home office instead of commuting to work, heating systems connected to the Internet, networked production and much more – there are high hopes that greenhouse gases can be saved with increasing digitization. Various studies have calculated that this could add up to a savings potential of up to 20 percent. The digital association Bitkom even came to the conclusion that 58 percent of the federal government’s climate target by 2030 could be achieved with accelerated digitization alone.
But is that all true? Are all factors included in these calculations? These are the questions Leibniz Center for European Economic Research (ZEW) in Mannheim as well as that Federal Environment Agency pursued. The balance of their studies is sobering: the contribution of the digital transformation is significantly smaller than expected. And it’s not even about digital currencies like Bitcoin. It consumes around 130 terawatt hours of electricity per year – a good 540 in all of Germany.
So why is it that only a little remains of the assumed savings in the overall balance? The main reasons: Information and communication technology usually cause higher demand. On the other hand, the greenhouse gases often only arise elsewhere if digital solutions are used, for example in low-wage countries. And finally, it is not enough if there is only the possibility to save CO₂ – you have to use it.
The authors of the study call for a “resolute policy”.
This is evident, for example, when it comes to travel. Although technology has made it possible to meet in video conferences for many years, the number of business trips increased by 30 percent between 2004 and 2019, according to the ZEW study. It was only when the pandemic made it simply impossible to meet in person that the long-established routine was broken. Today, even people who have traveled a lot on business believe that about every third business trip is avoidable.
“It could hardly be clearer that only a clear impetus through regulations makes win-win situations recognizable and opens up their ecological and economic potential,” argue the authors of the study. They conclude that a “determined policy” is needed to leverage the climate protection potential of digitization. For example, the already controversial tax concessions for company cars could be called into question.
However, decisive action and strict rules will not help everywhere. With the related topic home office, for example. The thing seems to be clear at first glance: if you work at home, you don’t have to drive to work. But that ignores the complexity of the problem. After all, a trip does not always serve just one purpose, according to the ZEW. Children are also taken to school or parents in need of care are visited. In a survey for the study, only a quarter of those surveyed expected to have to drive less, almost half would stay the same and almost a fifth even expect to have to drive more.
Digital heaters have little effect
The savings effect with digital heating controls is also relatively small. For example, they can throttle the output when the sun is shining or monitor the efficiency of the heating system. That does bring something, the Federal Environment Agency came to a figure of about ten percent in energy savings in its study. However, a part of this is eaten up again by the ecological balance of the electronic devices that are needed for this. In addition, such facilities are currently still niche applications. Even if, for example, all apartment buildings in Germany were equipped with it, a weather forecast control would only contribute around 3.6 percent to the savings that are to be achieved in the building sector by 2030, according to the Federal Environment Agency.
But after all, laptops, tablets and smartphones use a lot less electricity than the old PCs of yesteryear, don’t they? That’s true, but because users are now doing a lot more with it than they used to and are replacing smartphones and the like faster than old computers, the overall CO₂ balance is not good. The volume of data is constantly increasing, and transporting it requires a complex infrastructure, from the network devices to the data centers, from where streaming providers, for example, deliver their data. A tablet, for example, consumes ten times more energy in data centers and networks than on the end device itself. The data – such as videos – are often sent with high resolution, although you can’t see any difference on many devices. However, most of the energy goes into production. This usually does not take place in Germany. But the atmosphere doesn’t care who produces the greenhouse gas.
The authors of the ZEW study criticize many published studies on the climate impact of digitization. With “comparatively little effort and on the basis of assumptions that are not very reliable”, theoretical reduction potentials would be determined “without taking the complex system relationships into account”. They call on politicians to draw up basic rules of the game. Sustainability and climate protection must become the mainstream of digitization. “Our society should now be out of the phase where it can carelessly allow large industries and climate-damaging mass phenomena to emerge.”