By Ian, UWE Bristol Senior Lecturer and PhD student.
Senior Lecturer in Sustainable IT, Ian, decided to make the considerable transition from a management consultancy career to a PhD in designing sustainable IT systems. Guided by the UN Sustainable Development Goals, he now teaches UWE Bristol students about the importance of sustainable tech and business when striving for a greener future. Read more about Ian’s work.
How I found my career in Sustainable IT
My name’s Ian and I work at UWE Bristol as a Senior Lecturer in Sustainable IT. I’m also working on a PhD looking at how systems engineers can incorporate sustainability into the systems they design. However, I’ve spent most of my career working in management consultancy roles.
Working at IBM as a Sustainability Leader was the start of my transition into Sustainable IT and it really opened my eyes. I’m proud I was part of a project to implement IBM’s first data centre with sustainability credentials recognised by the EU. It became clear to me that our economy needs a dramatic transformation.
How IT gives us the potential to live more sustainably
Developments in IT allow us to live, work and travel smarter. Thanks to large scale IT systems, products and services are more accessible than ever before. And from video conferencing to electric cars, we’re now in a better position than ever to reduce our carbon footprint. However, IT contributes 1.5-2% of global greenhouse gas emissions.
Educating the next generation about sustainable IT
Alongside my research, I teach UWE Bristol students on a range of courses and modules relating to sustainability, business, and technology. Our first cohort of students on the Sustainable Business and Computing module graduated in 2021, and it’s been incredibly rewarding to know I’ve contributed to their journey. I know they’ve left with a greater awareness of the importance of sustainable tech and business.
One of the Master’s students I supervised chose to research Blackboard Learn, which is UWE Bristol’s virtual learning environment for teaching and learning. They looked at the environmental impact of moving our Blackboard system from UWE Bristol’s local servers to remote, cloud-based servers.
Whilst there can be efficiency and cost benefits, we discovered the cloud provider didn’t use 100% renewable energy. So moving our Blackboard system from UWE Bristol’s own servers, which are powered by fully renewable energy, unfortunately increased our overall carbon footprint.
How you can help keep your IT carbon footprint low
Don’t upgrade your phone or computer until you really need to, or buy a refurbished model instead. There are new smart phone manufacturers appearing on the market now with devices that are much easier to maintain and repair yourself.
Find out more on UWE Bristol’s Change the world with us webpage.