Sustainable development is an emerging strong trend that is driven by increasing prices of energy and natural resources, consumer awareness and legislation. ICT industry must find ways to develop their products in a sustainable way so that the products are still competitive and profitable. Moreover, ICT industry must find ways to solve environmental problems in other industries. This means seeking new solutions to reduce the environmental impact of ICT product development and the use of natural resources throughout the full product lifecycle. Sustainable development trend also offers new business opportunities, e.g. there is 15% carbon abatement potential in BAU CO2 emission by 2020 by applying smart ICT solutions in other industry sectors[1]. ICT industry can create new business by helping other industries to minimize their environmental impact.

The main objective is to gain measurable improvements regarding sustainable development. This will be achieved by developing approaches for reducing the environmental impact of software assets, reducing the impact of hardware through software, and seeking new applications for Green-ICT in other industries. The concrete deliverables will be tools and paradigms that help the developer estimate the impact of his design choices but also new architectural and algorithmic patterns.

[1] McKinsey/GeSI Smart 2020 Enabling the low carbon economy in the information age

Johan Lilius

Professor, Academic Lead of Strategic Theme

Åbo Akademi University

 

Pekka Palin

Development Manager

CSC - IT Center for Science Ltd