How can firms appraise and improve their digital carbon footprint, including their internet presence, asks Amy Czuba of Nexer Digital, a firm that supports businesses in developing digital products and services.
Over the last few years, emphasis on environmental sustainability in business practice has influenced the way many firms operate. Huge amounts of progress have been made regarding minimising the physical impact of buildings and supply chains on the environment, and many organisations have expressed commitments to strive for net-zero in the future.
IKEA, for example, has invested EUR 200 million into shifting its supply chain into renewable energy and removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere through reforestation and improved forest management practices, as well as taking steps to phase out virgin materials and reduce single-use practice packaging. Elsewhere, outdoor clothing brand Patagonia uses 100% renewable energy in offices and stores and encourages circular economy practices by providing clothes repairs and recycling used products
However, a critically overlooked factor in business environmental sustainability strategy is the digital carbon footprint.
The internet emits a significant amount of CO2 as servers at data centres require vast quantities of electricity to keep them up and running, and more to cool the centres to avoid overheating. Annually, the internet produces the same amount of carbon as Hong Kong, Singapore, Bangladesh, The Philippines, Sri Lanka, and Mongolia combined, and digital consumption has overtaken the airline industry in terms of CO2 emissions.
Although high energy consumption by the internet is inevitable, it doesn’t mean that businesses and organisations cannot take steps to reduce their digital carbon footprints in the same way they have with their physical footprints.
Due to a growing demand for environmental sustainability and ESG among customers, partners and investors, this is more important than ever. Businesses that have made promising progress in limiting physical impact need to ensure their digital impact is not counteracting the existing good work. For example, a company building that is green powered in real life may have its sustainability credentials let down by its website running on servers that are not powered by green energy.
Servers and hosting
Traditional server integration is one of the biggest expenses in terms of digital carbon output. Carrying incredibly high maintenance costs, they use up a lot of energy to keep running which simply isn’t environmentally sustainable. If traditional servers are to be used, organisations need to ensure they are being powered by green energy as much as possible.
Several key hosts are now making progress on this, with Microsoft, Amazon and Google all using at least 50% renewable energy to power their servers. Due to the massive amount of energy required to run data and server centres, switching to greener hosts is an essential part of reducing digital carbon footprint.
Moving away from traditional data servers to cloud-based servers will have a less significant impact on the environment. Cloud servers are more eco-friendly, as well as more cost-effective as businesses can simply pay for whichever services they need from them, making them the ideal option if possible.
By looking into existing hosts’ sustainability policies, organisations can confirm whether they are working with a company with meaningful statements of green energy in data centres as well as other facilities and wider eco-credentials in energy efficiency, electronic waste and travel. The best policies will have tangible, measurable commitments rather than vague statements.
The Green Web Foundation has a directory of sustainable hosts, which is a good place to start if an existing host isn’t committed to being green.
Know how to measure digital carbon footprint
Although many businesses are focusing on their physical carbon footprint, digital emissions may have been neglected as leaders simply aren’t aware of the significance to begin with. The first step to solving this problem is to assess current digital carbon outputs and identify where changes can be made, in the same way a business would for its physical footprint.
A single email can be responsible for 10g of used carbon, increasing to 50g if sent with an accompanying attachment. When taking into consideration how often emails are sent and received in a business setting, especially when replying to a large number of recipients at once in email chains, it is clear why digital carbon output needs to play a greater role in sustainability strategies.
Websites are also responsible for carbon output – the more complex the webpage is, the more carbon it emits. For example, certain colours, images, videos and anything else that puts more strain on bandwidth will use more energy. When an organisation starts its digital sustainability journey, it should benchmark its current carbon output using a Website Carbon Calculator, which will offer insight into how carbon-intensive the home page is and whether its servers use green energy.
By measuring digital carbon footprint, organisations can make conscious decisions on their digital practices, and build a plan for a more renewable and environmentally friendly strategy in the same way they do for their physical carbon footprint.
Website optimisation
Website pages can undergo a number of technical fixes to reduce their carbon footprint. By amending design and development, the type of content visible and how the site looks, companies can reduce the amount of loading and bandwidth required, which reduces the energy input needed to browse the website.
Compressing webpages makes them smaller and therefore less energy-intensive to access, and caching delivers copies of stored resources or pages instead of having to download them from the originating server. This can also be accomplished by optimising the website to require fewer requests or bundled requests that spend less time loading.
These techniques allow websites to deliver the same level of user experience to those accessing them, but the servers do not have to work as hard and are less energy-exhaustive in the process.
Content optimisation
Optimising the content found on web pages is a great way to be more eco-friendly and comes with the added benefit of being more consumer-friendly. All website content needs to be loaded, and therefore consuming it frequently or for long periods adds to carbon emission levels.
By ensuring web pages have clear and concise information on them, site visitors and consumers can find exactly what they’re looking for quickly and with fewer searches. Navigating between pages requires loading, so improving usability minimises the number of times users have to reload pages, reducing the level of CO2 produced.
Running readability tests on content will ensure it is easy to understand, reducing the amount of time website users spend on each page. Improving search engine optimisation (SEO) will make content more accessible, limiting the need for multiple Google searches and making the company website more visible in searches in the process.
Case study – Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh
As an organisation delivering world-leading plant science, conservation and education programmes, Royal Botanic Garden has started to improve the carbon footprint of its website to align with its wider philosophy. The project started with an audit in December 2021, revealing its homepage’s baseline emission of 1.70g of CO2 for each pageview. It was also revealed that its server was running on non-green energy.
Since the audit, there has been a promising start on a number of recommendations, such as looking at greener ways to host the site and improving the technical performance of the website so it is lighter and less exhaustive on resources. This has already resulted in a 15% reduction in CO2 per homepage visit.
Final thoughts
Businesses and organisations have a responsibility to engage in sustainable and eco-friendly practices to help preserve the natural environment. This is even more important when considering just how much of people’s everyday lives is taken up by digital content for both professional and personal use. Being mindful of a businesses’ own digital carbon footprint is the best way to ensure the environment is maintained as best as possible. Some organisations have taken leaps to decrease their physical carbon footprint, and digital footprint has to be the next key issue to focus on.
