Green ICT for growth and sustainability? Linking science and policy

Start/Stop Date:
30 May–01 Jun 2012
Organiser:
Vienna University of Economics and Business, Austria
Venue:
Vienna University of Economics and Business, Austria
Focus Areas:
Green growth and sustainability
Type of Event:
Conference

ICTs (Information and Communication Technologies) are widely regarded as enablers of “green growth” in various sectors of the economy and important means to tackle environmental challenges such as climate change. ICT systems enable more sustainable production and consumption processes (ranging from product-specific improvements to entire “smart systems” e.g. in transport or buildings) and have the potential to influence consumer choice and behaviour (e.g. reduced travel needs through telework; change of driving behaviour and energy use patterns through “smart technologies”). At the same time, ICT are expanding the use of technology, which leads to increased energy consumption and ICT also have considerably direct environmental impacts in terms of materials throughput and end-of-life treatment. Hence, there are various puzzling questions raised within the ICT domain with regards to its contribution to economic growth and sustainable consumption.

The RESPONDER Knowledge Brokerage event on “Green ICT for Growth and Sustainability?” focuses on potentials and challenges within the ICT domain with regards to their contribution to green growth and sustainable consumption. In particular, the aim is to stimulate discussions on the issues of network standby consumption, energy labeling, and smart metering, amongst others. The event aims to foster networking, mutual understanding and knowledge exchange between policy-makers and experienced researcher in the field.

Exemplary topics to be explored in system mapping sessions:

  1. What impacts on residential energy consumption can be expected from the introduction of energy labeling on consumer electronics?
  2. What is the potential of smart metering in encouraging energy savings in the long run?
  3. Will cloud computing lead to overall savings of energy and other resources?

Keynote Speakers

Lorenz Erdmann joined the Fraunhofer Institute for Systems and Innovation Research (ISI), Karlsruhe, as a senior researcher in 2011 after having worked for more than a decade at the Institute for Futures Studies and Technology Assessment (IZT), Berlin. He graduated with a degree in environmental engineering at the Technical University Berlin in 1998. His major research subjects include foresight methods, technology assessment, ICT and sustainable development. Lorenz Erdmann has served as an expert for sustainable ICT at high-level events on behalf of the OECD and EU.

Lorenz Hilty is professor of Informatics at the University of Zurich and Head of the Informatics and Sustainability Research (ISR) Group, an interdisciplinary team which is shared between the University of Zurich and Empa, the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology. His research focus includes the assessment of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) with regards to sustainability, ICT applications in sustainability research as well as methodologies of modelling and simulation. Lorenz Hilty is also the author of many articles and monographs in his field of expertise.

Peter Johnston is currently Senior Policy Advisor in the European Policy Centre in Brussels, an active Member of the Club of Rome, and Chairman of the International Advisory Council. He chaired the European Task Force on Innovation and the transition to a Green economy, and was a member of the core group of the Club of Rome advising the GLOBE group of legislators and the G20 on an integrated approach to energy, climate, development and bio-diversity challenges. Peter Johnston has been active in linking science, business and policy development for over 35 years.  He has worked with the European Commission, the British Government and the OECD in energy, environment, research and innovation policy analysis.

Inge Røpke is an ecological economist and associate professor at the Technical University of Denmark, Department of Management Engineering, Section for Innovation and Sustainability. She has published widely on technology in everyday life, ecological economics, and the relationship between consumption and the environment. Her latest research has been focused on consumption in a practice theory perspective, energy use and information technology as well as consumers’ role within the growth engine.

Vida Rozite is an analyst in the Energy Efficiency Unit of the International Energy Agency. Her main areas of responsibility include industry and appliances. She is currently involved in a project on networked standby that deals with policies and measures needed to address the issue of increasing excess energy consumption due to network-connectivity of appliances. Vida Rozite has also worked as a consultant at UNIDO, a senior advisor at Nordic Energy Research and an active researcher at International Institute of Industrial Environmental Economics of Lund University, Sweden.

Event Registration

Please note that the number of participants is limited to 40 people. For registration, please fill out the registration form and send it to ict@scp-responder.eu by April 20, 2012. Participants will receive a final confirmation letter of registration right after the deadline.

Registration form (pdf)