Sustainability in a Digital Context

While the three dimensions of sustainability, the three approaches to a sustainable system, and the three levels of sustainability in a corporate environment all remain relevant and valid, additionally another three dimensions have to be considered when discussing the sustainability of digital artifacts. In this context, the term digital artifacts covers everything man-made and digital, therefore data and software, alike. The dimension “Sustainability of ICT” is focusing on the use of material resources and energy to develop, build, maintain, upgrade, re-furbish and finally dispose of all the hardware necessary to access any digital artifact and make it useful. The dimension “Sustainability through ICT”, on the other hand, concentrates on the sustainability-related effects digital artifacts can have. Frequently cited examples are the increased efficiency of combustion engines through electronically controlled injection, more fuel-efficient software-based route planning for delivery services or IT-generated flight profiles, saving fuel and time. The chapter then continues to elaborate the ten criteria of sustainable digital artifacts, and concludes by discussing the indirect effects digital artifacts might have.