Green IT

Coming from an interaction Design background, I often wondered how can digital objects and interfaces be used for environmental purposes without being hypocritical… Here are a few answers I found…

Is the use of digital essential?

In 2020, Strategy Analytics counts 25 billion IoT devices in the world, while the ICT networks (Internet and Communication Technologies) contributes to 4% of global greenhouse emissions (Shift Project). The question of usefulness is the first question a designer should ask when it comes to creating a digital product. A smart object or an app, that will need the support of a smartphone, both imply the extraction and transformation of rare materials to produce electronic components, as well as the use of servers, in data centers, that run on high energy demand, without talking about the transportation of these things and these data. Low-tech solutions can be alternatives to high-tech, which in many cases, has become more of an easy automatism than a real add-on.

Only the necessary

I will focus now on Interface Design and interface development, which have many hidden ways to avoid creating uselessly heavy apps and websites. Since 2010, the weight of a website has more than tripled. First, as images and videos are the heaviest content of a page, choosing fewer visuals but more relevant ones is one of the first steps to take. A graphical process for images, the “dithering” can even be used to make them as light as possible, keeping only the main information of the image. Also, if a video is already hosted on a service like Vimeo or Youtube, a simple link to this video will be much lighter than downloading the whole video each time the page is opened. It is also interesting to notice that some type-font families are already locally installed on devices, meaning that it reduces the amount of content that needs to be loaded when opening a page. It’s the case for example of Arial, Times New Roman, Verdana, etc…

Animations, that can add a really interactive and dynamic dimension to an interface, can also distract the user from his.her objective and create a sense of superficiality or even make the experience confusing. Animations are also very heavy Javascript programs that are run over and over. Therefore, static content should be preferred (HTML/CSS). Talking of coding, each line or character has its weight and minimizing the number and weight of the files means minimizing the energy used to read it online.

Hosting a website on a local server (why not a home-made Rasberry Pie running with a wind-turbine?) or a server that runs through renewable energy (or at least, doing carbon offsetting) is one more way to make a sustainable website. As for the Cookies and Google Analytics, these are also very energy-consuming and are often used without purpose.

Here are some initiatives to make low carbon emission websites:

Check your website’s carbon footprint with the Green Foundation calculator or with WebsiteCarbon
Greenspector is a French company that makes audits of existing websites and helps to design and develop them with less ecological impact.

Creativity for low-tech solutions

Being an undecided technosceptical designer, I do not think that we should reject all technologies. I believe there are many better ways to use technologies and to teach them than what is considered as granted nowadays. But the alternatives I suggest here are just part of the visible part of the iceberg! I hope that a new Design and Tech culture will emerge very soon and that creativity, low-tech and local solutions will enable a more sustainable world.

Here are some examples of low-tech websites:

The website of the MUCEM museum in Marseille finds its graphic temperament thanks to the powerful use of typography.
The Low-Tech Magazine makes beautiful use of the dithering effect.
The Hackstock podcast website is about the hackers’ culture and uses monochrome images (reducing their weight) and minimalistic content.
Los Angeles Ends is an interactive audio-visual experience that is just super interesting!
NODE is another minimalist website with tech tutorials.
The Bare Project addresses the problem of optimization of techs