Hi, my name is Peter Arnfalk.
And today, I will talk about e-materialization and virtual mobility.
Going digital offers companies and the rest of our society a range of
really interesting opportunities to save energy and resources and to cut costs.
Moving bits in the digital world requires just a fraction of
the energy it takes to move atoms in the physical world.
Producing a digital copy requires less resources than it takes to
produce a physical product.
Often so much less that we're talking 10 or 100 times more eco-efficient solutions.
Some examples of this are streaming music instead of buying records or
CDs, or reading e-books instead of paperbacks,
reading your news on the phone or on a tablet, or
getting your invoices and receipts electronically.
De-materialisation or e-materialisation is a way of doing more with less.
In the case of e-materialisation, a physical product is
replaced by an electronic or digital service providing the same or
similar function as the physical product does.
Digital solutions also make it possible for people to do and
to get access to things without having to physically go to a certain place.
It enables us to communicate instantly with people halfway across the world.
It enables us to telework - that is - working from home or
from another place outside the regular office.
It also gives students all around the world access to a multitude of
educational resources that they never had access to before, and
the ability to attend schools and universities around the world.
This is referred to as virtual mobility.
And this course in Greening the Economy is also an example of this.
Virtual mobility can influence our travel patterns.
Say an employee teleworkes regularly two days per week from home,
this can cut their weekly commute by 40%.
Companies and other organizations investing in good system for
virtual meetings, commonly save about 20 to 30% of their business travel.
Some companies report much higher savings.
In fact, driving one hour by car emits as much carbon dioxide as
talking on the phone for one full year.
Efforts to make the transport system more sustainable, including public transport,
bicycling, and alternative fuels have so far not been sufficient to turn the trend.
And virtual mobility can offer companies and
other organizations a green option to cut transport emission and cost.
A win-win solution.
So, this sounds great.
Will this digital revolution automatically solve all of
our major environmental problems?
Well, there are a few challenges.
For example, all digital services need products and an IT infrastructure to work.
Things like servers, computers, telephones, and
fiber optic cables to connect it all together.
All of these need to be manufactured, they require electricity to work.
And when they are replaced, they turn into electronic waste.
The product lifecycle for IT products is relatively short and resource demanding.
It's estimated that the ICT sector generates about 2 to 3% of
all carbon dioxide emissions, about the same as the aviation industry.
The number of IT products is also rapidly growing and
their lifespans are getting shorter.
Another challenge is that if we want this virtualization to reduce our energy and
material consumption, it has to actually substitute or replace something,
like e-books and online newspaper replacing physical books and newspapers,
which reduces the need to produce and distribute printed paper products.
This is the vision of the paperless society.
However, these environmentally promising gains have
often failed to meet expectations.
Although we're increasingly reading things online,
we have continued to buy books and newspapers.
The digital alternative then becomes a complement, not a substitute,
to the physical one.
And many people still prefer to print electronic documents in order to
read text on paper.
In this case, we're experiencing a generating effect,
resulting in even higher consumption of paper.
The effects of substitution, complementarity, and
generation all takes place in parallel.
But we're now noticing that since a few years back,
the substitution effect is becoming relatively stronger.
For example, resulting in fewer newspapers and paper books being sold.
And that hardly anyone sends a postal letter or card any more, as they're being
replaced by digital solutions like emails and social media apps like Instagram.
The third challenge is the rebound effect.
That is, by making things more efficient, we're saving resources,
such as energy and time.
The problem is that these freed up resources are often used for
other consumption, resulting in that the net savings are reduced or
even eaten up completely.
For example, when business meetings are held online, costly and
time consuming business travel is avoided, saving the company both time and money.
However, the time saved will likely be used for more work and
the money likely used to consume other products or services, including travel.
So, does this mean that a digital revolution is
a lost eco-efficiency opportunity?
No.
But we need to recognize the potential and to utilize it.
e-materialization and virtual mobility offers us options.
If we, as society, are to change old habits and to promote climate-friendly solutions,
we need to support this development at all levels to make this happen.
National and local government, businesses and individuals.
In Sweden, for example, the government has adopted a green IT strategy
that says that state agencies should buy resource and energy efficient products.
This strategy also promotes virtual meetings while
introducing disincentives for business travel.
TeliaSonera, a major Swedish-Finnish IT company has for ten years worked
strategically to reduce business travel by replacing it with virtual meetings.
Starting by scrapping its travel policy and introducing a meeting policy instead.
Since then, they have cut travel costs by 65% and
reduced flights by 73% per employee.
So while there are challenges that need to be overcome,
virtual mobility and e-materialization can help companies and
other organizations to become more eco-efficient,
enabling society to take a great digital leap forward towards a greener economy.
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