Why IT?

Why call on IT leaders to be climate leaders?

The climate change impact of the IT industry on emissions is being recognised more widely and starting to be addressed. What is less well known is that IT has the potential to be a big part of the solution to climate change.

We are pressuring the biggest names in the IT industry to move quickly to produce climate solutions and reduce their own emissions. The impact of the IT industry can be summarised as:

The ICT sector creates two percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. That's the bad news. The good news is that its services and products could cut the world's emissions by an estimated 15 percent when applied in industry, buildings, transport and power sectors.

Currently the industry's carbon footprint is growing, and much of these green IT opportunities remain unrealized potential or lack the detailed studies to show how and where they can reduce overall emissions.

The potential is huge - in fact there are not many areas of the economy where IT climate solutions could not help cut greenhouse gas emissions. (Click to see a full chart of ICT climate solutions opportunities).

But time is short to reach the goal of 15 percent reduction by 2020 so companies need to be showing now which technologies and solutions have the biggest impact on overall emissions.

As well as being good for the climate, effective, measurable climate solutions, implemented on a wide scale will mean big profits for the IT industry. The biggest opportunity for the IT industry will be if governments legislate for strong mandatory emissions reduction targets by 2020.

Given there is big money at stake you would think IT bosses would be falling over themselves to push politicians to legislate and make their solutions even more profitable right? Nope, wrong (so far). Politicians are preparing to meet in Copenhagen this December to agree on a successor to the Kyoto Protocol. A strong Copenhagen deal will create the right market conditions for a massive roll-out of smart technologies. But only one big Tech CEO has stepped up to urge a strong deal, with the rest leaving the floor wide open for polluting industry to bully politicians in to making weak or ineffective climate legislation.

That, in 367 words, is why we're campaigning to make champion climate leaders out of these IT industry leaders. But this is a big and complex issue so below are more specifics, analysis of how the IT industry measures up against the lobbying of the dirty fossil fuel industries, what the companies are currently doing in detail on climate advocacy and why the time to speak up is now - both for the companies and the people they listen to - us, their customers.

The climate can't wait for Champions

The IT industry could make money, create new markets and generate new jobs while helping to stop runaway climate change: A win-win for business and the planet. That's the clean tech revolution we need now, not business as usual promoted by dirty industry. Coal, oil, car and power companies are the heavyweights of the climate debate right now and almost all are fighting for the wrong side. To counter them the climate needs champions now who are not afraid to put their full weight behind the clean tech revolution.

That why right now we are focusing in on Google, IBM and Microsoft. All three have redefined many parts of the economy and swept away inefficient business models. They have the power and influence to push governments to make a strong deal at the Copenhagen climate conference this December.

So we're calling on Google, IBM and Microsoft to demand a fair, ambitious, and binding deal to save the climate.

How cool would that be?

How to help the campaign

This website exposes the gap between what the IT industry could do to fight climate change, and what they're doing today. As the leaderboard shows, there's a long way to go (hint: They're scored out of 100). Every IT executive's profile page also includes a list of actions you can take to help pressure him to act.