On Digital Sustainability and Digital Public Goods

Several 2022 reports from government and academic organisations contain the key message that sustainable development can be achieved using digital technologies. The report ‹Digital Reset› (Digitalization for Sustainability, 2022) calls for using digital technologies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and resource waste in the agriculture, mobility, industry, and energy sectors. The researchers see digitalisation as a means to an end for sustainable transformation. Similarly, the report by the Coalition for Digital Environmental Sustainability (CODES, 2022), presents an action plan that includes impact initiatives to «achieve a sustainable planet in the digital age». The EU argues that digital technologies must play a key role in achieving climate neutrality in the EU by 2050 (Muench et al., 2022). The authors call for a ‹twin transition›, managing digital and green transitions simultaneously so that they reinforce each other.