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36C3 - Reducing Carbon in the Digital Realm

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    36C3 preroll music
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    Herald: Our next speaker is Chris Adams,
    and we were talking about reducing carbon
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    in the digital realm. How to understand
    the environmental impact of the digital
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    products you built and take measurable
    steps to green your stack. Floor is yours.
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    Chris Adams: Cool! applause Hello
    everyone. First of all, can you folks hear
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    me in the back? Yeah. If you can just
    raise your hands. Excellent, cooI! All
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    right. Hello everyone. My name is Chris
    Adams. As you can see, Mr. Credit, Chris
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    Adams on pretty much every online ralley.
    Please don't try to follow this link
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    because it's not actually gonna go
    anywhere yet, but it will be up at the end
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    of this talk. I'm just going to introduce
    myself. If you don't already know me, my
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    name is Chris Adams. I have a background
    working in environmental kind of wacky
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    startups from Loco2, which was all about
    trying to make trains easier to book than
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    planes. A.M.E.E, which was all about
    putting kind of carbon calculation as an
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    API, so you could work out the carbon
    footprint of anything. And now I spend a
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    bunch of my time working with the Green
    Web Foundation, where our mission is to
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    basically make the web green. And I also
    help organize an online community called
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    ClimateAction.tech, which as you can see
    is for folk like yourselves who want to
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    work out how to do something about climate
    in their day job and what they do. I've
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    got about 45 minutes with you and this is
    a kind of rough outline for the day. I'm
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    gonna briefly give you a kind of primer on
    how you measure carbon and why you might
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    measure that. I'll share with you a mental
    model which I found useful for helping
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    think about what steps I can actually take
    as professional working in this field; and
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    then I'll give you some pointers of where
    to go next. If you feel compelled to do
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    something about, well, what is essentially
    an existential challenge and the biggest
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    challenge we are already facing. So first
    of all, measuring carbon! So, can you just
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    show you... raise your hands if you've
    seen this before? Yes. The water cycle. So
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    you get the idea that we've got like a
    water, kind of, evaporates, goes along
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    into the sky, then comes down and rains.
    And then... generally it's best if it
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    doesn't go in one place because that's
    that's a good thing. But generally we have
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    like cycles in nature and one of them we
    have is for water and we also have
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    cycles elsewhere. And that's kind of why I
    want to share with you here, because there
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    are also cycles around carbon. So what
    you're seeing here is actually some freeze
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    frames of a really, really cool but
    somewhat confusing video. And as I was
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    saying, kind of carbon works on a kind of
    slower timescale that might have here. So,
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    this is an... this is basically a diagram
    of all the carbon in the world with some
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    idea of proportions. All right? So, the
    green stuff up here, this is us like we're
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    made of carbon. It turns out. So a tree.
    Trees are made of carbon. And when living
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    things die and decompose, some of the
    carbon ends in the atmosphere as we
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    decompose. The purple stuff here - this is
    like the ocean. Fish are made of carbon,
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    too. And so are plants and everything like
    that. And when they die, they sink down,
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    which is why you've got this massive
    chunky like stock of carbon down here.
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    Eventually, some of that might become
    sediment, then form rock, then end up in
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    this kind of black stuff around here,
    which we kind of consider that the earth's
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    crust. So then at the top, we've got
    carbon in the atmosphere. So you really
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    can't see it very well. But there is
    carbon up here. This is kind of
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    atmospheric carbon, really. And there is
    like if you watch this video that I've
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    linked to, you can see all moving around
    as a cycle. But this is kind of wealth
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    carbon, really. So now in about 1850, we
    started using a lot more energy. And
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    to meet that demand of all this energy, we
    started burning fossil fuels in earnest as
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    well as burning wood for fuel. And you can
    see the fossil fuels here as kind of stuff
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    that's kind of come out of here and is now
    represented here. And we've also taken
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    some carbon in the earth and burn some of
    that, and like... What is it? Where does
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    this all go? There's a clue in these
    arrows on the screen. Right? Now if we
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    fast forward to 2017, it looks a bit more
    like this. You've seen like there's less
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    of this red stuff down here because it's
    got into here and because it's circulated
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    all the way around. We've ended up with
    carbon in other parts of Earth. And, in
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    particular, you'll see that we have fewer
    red dots down here, but we've got a lot
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    more around here, which is going to pushed
    some of the carbon higher up here. So this
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    is kind of... if there's one thing I want
    you to kind of really take away is that
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    when we talk about climate, it's really
    about carbon. And we need as an industry
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    to be able to get good at understanding
    how to reduce carbon more than anything
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    else. If we're going to be thinking about
    climate. Now, I'll try and break this down
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    to a kind of simple way, which I found
    really, really useful for this. There's a
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    lady on Twitter. Her name is Professor
    Julia Kay Steinberger. She's awesome. She
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    has this really nice way. She recently
    shared this thread on Twitter where she
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    basically explained how she explains kind of
    climate change to her children who are 4
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    and 7 years old. And she basically did it
    this way. She got like a globe, wrapped it
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    in some plastic and then said, well, this
    is basically what happens. You understand
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    the idea of being wrapped up in things
    getting warm and things getting too warm.
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    That's it. And like, that turned out to be
    a really effective way for her to do it.
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    And it turned out if kids can get this
    stuff, then I think we can. And I think
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    it's really, really useful for us to kind
    of be aware that carbon is actually a thing
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    that we do need to be able to count, and
    track and account for in our jobs. So
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    we've spoken about this on a planetary
    scale, which isn't all that actionable.
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    But if we were to kind of bring this down
    to organizational scale, where the most of
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    us might kind of work and more specific,
    it might be easier for us to act upon. It
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    might look a little bit like this. There
    are established ways to measure carbon
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    within an organization you work in and in
    the same way that accountants might talk
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    about legal ownership of a company. There
    are guidelines for talking about who has
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    responsibility for emissions when you're
    reporting and deciding who should be
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    changed, who should be making reductions.
    And I'm sure in this diagram here to
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    actually take some very, very dull, dry
    material into something that we can relate
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    to, which is hot beverages and coffee.
    And, generally, you can think of it like
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    this: if either these three kind of
    scopes, there's this idea of scope 1
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    emissions, which is basically if I burn
    fossil fuels to heat up a, say, container
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    so I can have coffee, then that's the
    emissions from me burning less fossil
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    fuels myself and my scope 1 emissions.
    Scope 2 might be me using a kettle. So if
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    someone is a burning coal to generate
    electricity for me to kind of boil the
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    kettle, then that's my scope 2. Now scope
    3 might be me walking to a store or into a
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    coffee shop and all the emissions and all
    of that supply chain - that's my scope 3.
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    So there's this idea of kind of like
    dependency chain of carbon, which...
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    because I'm speaking to a bunch of people
    who have some understanding where
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    technology I think you should be, kind of,
    you should be ready to be comfortable with
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    the concept of dependency chains and
    things like that. And to make this a bit
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    more concrete, I refer to, say, a good
    example. So Stripe... Has anyone heard of
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    Stripe here? Okay, a few of you. Okay. So,
    basically, payments company. All right?
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    Now they are actually pretty good about
    sharing information about what they do and
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    what their emissions are. And you can see
    this here. They've basically got... in
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    2017, they started making noises about
    becoming carbon neutral and they started
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    reporting information in these kind of
    scopes here. And you'll see this phrase -
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    TCO2E, but basically just think of that as
    carbon dioxide, the stuff that's warming
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    up the world because there's different
    gases, but they all have more or less the
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    same effect. So in many cases, people will
    use the term CO2E2 to describe all of
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    these kind of basket of gases. All right?
    But you see here that from a scope 1
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    emissions are quite small because they're
    usually just heating a building. Scope 2
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    is a little bit higher, because they pay
    to, say, keep a building running. And then
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    you'll see down here that there's massive
    scope 3, because they tend to pay for a
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    lift infrastructure and have a lot of
    people flying around as if they're prevent
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    a lists??? and so on. All right? Let's
    look at some other other examples. Amazon!
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    So Amazon repeat started reporting on CO2
    emissions for the first time this year.
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    And long story short, their carbon
    footprint is about the same as the country
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    of Finland. Right. Which is kind of large.
    And as you can see, because obviously they
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    run lots of services, which is why you got
    4,5 million tonnes of CO2. They also have
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    a lot of warehouses and things like that,
    and have a lot of kind of cars or vehicles
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    that are getting things around. But
    because they actually have a large supply
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    chain themselves, they have a massive
    honking great scope set of scope 3
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    emissions. So let's look at another
    company, right. Google. So Google is a
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    Google has a surprisingly low emissions
    considering scale, about the same as the
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    African country of Liberia. All right?
    Now, there's something interesting here.
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    Google have reported their emissions with
    scope 1, 2 that you can see here. And 3,
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    but they have this interesting thing here,
    where this is the energy they're using.
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    But this is the energy they say that
    they're using because they are purchasing
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    what are basically renewable energy
    credits, which is one way of using green
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    energy. If you do not have access to green
    energy in certain parts of the grid and
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    Google are pretty good in this field, but
    it's worth bearing that in mind. Google
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    are transparent about this stuff, where at
    Amazon, you don't see these numbers. So
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    this number could be somewhat higher for
    we know. All right. So this gives you an
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    idea of what some of these numbers might
    look like. And then let's look at another
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    company, which is also, well I assume you
    might have heard of. Is this works? Yes. I
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    go to Apple. Yeah. So Apple has... these
    are their emissions with just their
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    facilities. So just their data centers and
    just, say, the offices that they have.
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    Right. So this is quite low, by
    comparison. Right. So this is carbon
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    emissions of maybe Gambia - another
    small African country. All right. And
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    you'll see once again, by sourcing
    renewable energy, they've had a kind of
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    quite big reduction in the emissions that
    they otherwise wouldn't had. But you'll
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    also see that in scope 3, because there's
    lots of flying and because there's lots of
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    commuting, they have a lovely new office
    miles away from anywhere. So you have to
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    drive to get there, you know, it's like, I
    don't know, 40 percent of the emissions
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    were just their facilities. We have to
    drive there and back. All right. But if
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    you look at the emissions from Apple as
    all the products that people buy, you'll
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    see that the emissions are somewhat
    larger, about the same size as Mongolia,
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    which is kind of large. And you will also
    see that there is a large... this is a
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    breakdown from Apples annual report, and
    they basically... they're pretty
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    transparent about this stuff and they're
    good on this. And they say this is where
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    the emissions come from. And you can see
    all the way around here, this is the
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    manufacturing. The machines they have. And
    then if we zoom in to like this bit over
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    here. Right. You'll see that there's a
    little bit of information there. There's
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    like, obviously use phase. But the main
    car, the main impact from what they do is
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    actually making the electronics. So this
    is kind of how we tend to think about a
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    carbon and how one might report
    on carbon and make it and make decisions
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    to reduce carbon. All right. Now, I'm
    going to share with you a mental model,
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    which I found helpful in this field. I
    call it Platform, Packets and Process. And
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    it's generally aimed taking something
    which is quite abstract to this scope 1, 2
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    and 3 thing, to something that you might
    act upon inside the teams that you work
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    in. And it kind of maps to the kind of
    groups that you might be working in if
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    you're, say, a frontend developer or a
    backend developer, or a designer, or
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    product manager. So it kind of tries to
    map to that. And as you can see, platform
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    might be infrastructure you run; Packets
    is infrastructure other folk run, like the
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    rest of the Internet; and Process would be
    decisions that are made inside your
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    organization that cause that to be
    emissions. So if you highlight a large
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    company and you have a massive, say,
    corporate campus which is miles away from
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    everyone else has to drive to. Then
    there's gonna be a load of emissions from
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    that decision that you actually make. So
    let's run through this. On the scope 1, 2,
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    3 thing I shared with you, this is a kind
    of how it maps. And this might look like
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    some of the things, some activities you
    might have been involved in that will
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    create emissions. So, generally, on the
    platform side, if you're running
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    infrastructure yourself, there'll be scope
    2; if it's scope 3 you'll see here and,
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    well, I'll go into the other ones in more
    detail later. All right. So this is the
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    model that I'm sharing with you today. All
    right. So let's have a look at Platform:
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    infrastructure that you run. There are
    kind of three levels, which I'm going to
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    share with you today, which might be of
    use to you. All right. There are so
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    basically Provisioning, Provider and I'm a
    bit worried about showing this last one
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    because it's kind of new: the other
    programing languages. And that's partly
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    based on some stuff from yesterday. But
    also, I'm a bit worried about kind of
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    inciting the pitchfolks when I share this.
    But we'll see where we go with this. So
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    Provisioning is one level you might
    actually have if you build digital
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    products and you run servers. All right.
    So this chart you see here is a chart from
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    the CEO Power of Wireless Cloud Report.
    This basically shows how Australia uses
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    the Internet and it gives you an idea
    that, well, we don't use the Internet in a
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    uniform fashion all the time, because
    basically if you think about us being set
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    at midnight as we tend to fall asleep, we
    tend to use Internet less. All right. And
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    then as we wake up, we might say kind of
    have coffee or something like that, then
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    as more of us come to work, we start using
    it more. And then later on we work during
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    the day, then we'll go home. But you will
    start watching Netflix and things. And
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    then once again, we fall asleep and then
    we get to there. So there is a kind of
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    pattern. And if you have any analytics on
    how your own tools are using your ad
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    services are used, you'll see these kind
    of waves and patterns in how it works. And
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    this is worth bearing in mind, because
    traditionally when we've had to provision
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    services to support something like a Web
    site or a video streaming service, the way
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    that we used to do it was basically buy a
    big server that can handle the peak usage.
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    And we just accept that. Because
    Provisioning is quite a difficult kind of,
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    because it's a pain to do. We just leave
    this big box idling most of the time in
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    the hope that we could actually hit the
    surfing at the peak, right. Now the
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    downside of that is that, well, if we can
    make this conceptual leap that the cloud
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    computing is someone else's computer, then
    it shouldn't be that much of a leap again,
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    to realize that computers run electricity
    and we generally burn fossil fuels right
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    now to generate electricity. So in the
    example we had before, when we had this
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    big box that wasn't being used, we would
    basically be burning money to pay for
  • 15:04 - 15:08
    capacity, we didn't have. But we're also
    burning fossil fuels and causing emissions
  • 15:08 - 15:13
    one way. Now we've got better kind of
    running infrastructure. All right. So
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    we've had this kind of trend over the
    last, say, 10 to 15 years to abstract
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    machines away to make them easier to
    manage. So this might be VMs or
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    containers, or dinos, or unicorns, or
    whatever you might prefer to use. But in
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    general, the pattern is make something
    more abstract and then make it easier to
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    spin it up and down in response to demand.
    All right. This is better because we now
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    have something looks a bit like this. So
    we are not... we're wasting less well,
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    we're burning less money, but we're still
    burning money. And as a result, we're
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    still burning fossil fuels. Now, there's
    some new changes in the last few years,
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    which are relatively recent, and we're
    seeing kind of changes in how we work now,
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    which look a lot, look and sound is
    sometimes referred to as like service lists
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    or functions as a service if you work on
    the backend with the servers, right. Now
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    here, this is interesting, because we're
    rewarded for efficient use of computers,
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    because we basically pay on a per request
    basis. So if someone tries to load a page,
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    we pay for specifically that request. And
    then when we're not using it,
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    theoretically we're paying for nothing and
    theoretically things can spin right down.
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    So there's a much clearer mapping between
    the usage and what you would pay for here.
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    Now, there is a trade off here that is the
    number of providers that if you want to
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    use tools like this and have this much
    tighter mapping is that we end up with a
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    small number of people who do provide
    this. So if you were to go to, if you want
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    to move to something like this, you
    generally end up using something like
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    either Microsoft Stacks or Google or AWS.
    And this kind of presents us with a kind
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    of awkward problem right now. If we care
    about climate and we care about like
  • 16:55 - 17:00
    basically being able to solve problems, as
    say professionals, we have to choose two
  • 17:00 - 17:04
    of these three things. So we kind of care
    about the fossil fuel thing because we're
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    in a climate crisis officially now. All
    right. Also since I think December, when
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    the EU parlament declared this. If you've
    used to running any kind of online
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    service, you'll be aware that in many
    cases there is a kind of shift to
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    basically use a hosted thing, because it
    turns out that running infrastructure is
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    extremely complicated. And in many cases,
    if you can buy versus build, then you'll
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    often save yourself a lot of hassle. And
    the final one thing is, well, avoiding
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    oligopolies is quite a good thing, and
    because diverse ecosystems are healthy
  • 17:33 - 17:38
    ecosystems and we kind of don't really
    have so many options right now; if you do
  • 17:38 - 17:42
    care about this, it does feel a little bit
    like this. And as we saw from just
  • 17:42 - 17:48
    yesterday, if you are at this stage, you
    saw Gillian Oliver talking about this and
  • 17:48 - 17:53
    how much infrastructure you had to run
    themselves, in many cases because we
  • 17:53 - 17:56
    didn't win it with this consolidation,
    where if you want to use one service, you
  • 17:56 - 18:01
    have to buy into all these other things
    associated with that company. All right.
  • 18:01 - 18:05
    So that's one of the trade off you might
    have to think about when it comes to, say,
  • 18:05 - 18:09
    Platform and Provisioning. Provider is
    also another decision that might affect
  • 18:09 - 18:15
    it. Now, I didn't mention in the beginning
    of this talk that you can basically reduce
  • 18:15 - 18:20
    emissions from what you do. If you say a
    cloud provide like AWS just by running it
  • 18:20 - 18:26
    in a different region. So you can see this
    map here. This is by this person who is
  • 18:26 - 18:30
    best paid by Amazon to build kind of
    sketch naughty things. And this is a list
  • 18:30 - 18:33
    of all the data centers and you'll see the
    ones with the green leaves, which are
  • 18:33 - 18:38
    marked as kind of sustainable regions. And
    you see on the right hand side on the east
  • 18:38 - 18:41
    coast of America, which is around North
    Virginia, which has traditionally been
  • 18:41 - 18:46
    coal country - you don't have much in the
    green regions there, but on the left hand
  • 18:46 - 18:50
    side, where you see a lot of kind of
    leaves. And that's because on the west
  • 18:50 - 18:56
    coast of America, there's a lot more hydro
    and things like that. So, you know,
  • 18:56 - 19:00
    with kind of a lower CO2 for each kind of
    unit of computer that you're paying for.
  • 19:00 - 19:05
    So, yes, you can reduce emissions just by
    switching from one region to another
  • 19:05 - 19:10
    region. And this is because, basically, to
    expand that point I shared with you
  • 19:10 - 19:16
    before, where you are in the world... like
    the place will affect the carbon intensity
  • 19:16 - 19:20
    of the emissions that come from running
    infrastructure anywhere. So let's have a
  • 19:20 - 19:25
    look at Europe. Right. So France kind of
    green full of nukes, right. So that's good
  • 19:25 - 19:30
    for some people, maybe less so in Germany.
    Right. Germany, which is up here, this is
  • 19:30 - 19:35
    the land of solar and coal. Right. So
    we're not all that green. England is
  • 19:35 - 19:38
    actually got lit up quite a bit better
    than it was before. But up here, you can
  • 19:38 - 19:43
    see Poland: aww, not so good. Poland is
    really, really into coal. And as you can
  • 19:43 - 19:47
    see up here in the Nordic states where
    there's loads and loads of mountains and
  • 19:47 - 19:51
    wind and water, that things are really,
    really green. And this gives you an idea
  • 19:51 - 19:54
    that you can kind of see where the
    emission, the likely emissions might be
  • 19:54 - 19:58
    depending on where you're on the world and
    that you might make decisions based on
  • 19:58 - 20:01
    this. But to have to kind of compare
    against this is gonna be quite complicated
  • 20:01 - 20:06
    process. So one thing that we do. All
    right. The Green Web Foundation, which is
  • 20:06 - 20:10
    where I currently work, is we build like a
    directory to make it easier for you to
  • 20:10 - 20:15
    make that, to do the right thing. And we
    present this information as an API and as
  • 20:15 - 20:18
    data sets for you to kind of build into
    your own tool in which I'll expand a
  • 20:18 - 20:21
    little bit later. But one of the key
    things is that your provider will actually
  • 20:21 - 20:26
    have an impact on who you... basically,
    where something is will have an impact on
  • 20:26 - 20:32
    emissions from here. There is also... At this point
    here I wanna segue a bit into kind of
  • 20:32 - 20:38
    energy markets, because when you start
    working with computers and if you have to,
  • 20:38 - 20:42
    if you're responsible for any service, the
    more you think about cloud or how to work
  • 20:42 - 20:47
    with cloud, the more you realize how many
    parallels there are to energy markets.
  • 20:47 - 20:53
    Now energy markets are really interesting
    in lots of strange ways, right. So in
  • 20:53 - 20:57
    Europe, but actually in lots of places
    around the world, you can have cases where
  • 20:57 - 21:02
    the cost of electricity is actually
    negative rather than positive. So like on
  • 21:02 - 21:07
    a day where there's which is really,
    really sunny or really, really windy, it's
  • 21:07 - 21:12
    actually cheaper for the grid to basically
    pay people to basically take energy off
  • 21:12 - 21:18
    the grid to keep it stable than it is to
    say power down a nuclear power station
  • 21:18 - 21:22
    or power down some kind of large coal
    fired power station. And then under
  • 21:22 - 21:25
    assault, you end up with these scenarios
    where you have a negative and you have
  • 21:25 - 21:30
    negative cost. And one of the reasons here
    is to basically get people to kind of take
  • 21:30 - 21:34
    this demand and put it to use in other
    places. And I'm sharing this with you
  • 21:34 - 21:38
    because it's the kind of the idea like
    shifting load might be might be something
  • 21:38 - 21:44
    you're aware of as developers or trying to
    kind of delay jobs, for example. But you
  • 21:44 - 21:48
    see this manifesting now in how we use
    energy, but basically things like with
  • 21:48 - 21:54
    IV's and things. So this is an example:
    Bulb energy in the UK. They will
  • 21:54 - 21:58
    basically... if you have a car, they,
    basically have time rest now, where
  • 21:58 - 22:03
    depending on the time of day or if you're
    prepared to kind of provide, be a little
  • 22:03 - 22:07
    bit less strict about when you need
    something running, then you'll get a
  • 22:07 - 22:13
    cheaper electricity. And why am I sharing
    this with you? Because I think you start
  • 22:13 - 22:21
    to see things like this in the realm of
    like computing now. So this is a paper
  • 22:21 - 22:27
    that was shared this year, the ICT for
    Sustainability (ICT4S), basic conference
  • 22:27 - 22:32
    in Lapperate, which I've misspelt. Sorry,
    Finnish people. And the general idea is
  • 22:32 - 22:37
    that these people started building Kubernetes
    Scheduler to basically run a docker container,
  • 22:37 - 22:43
    run machines, run workloads where
    energy was cheap and green by basically
  • 22:43 - 22:51
    tracking where it was sunny really. And
    they were able to do this on where they
  • 22:51 - 22:55
    end up working with Microsoft to do this,
    because Microsoft is one large company
  • 22:55 - 22:59
    that has a number of data centers all
    around the world. But it kind of sucks
  • 22:59 - 23:03
    that there's only one company that you can
    actually get this stuff from, or if you
  • 23:03 - 23:06
    wanted to do something kind of
    cool with, say, a more
  • 23:06 - 23:10
    decentralized use of the web that... you
    have to kind of go through one large
  • 23:10 - 23:16
    company. And if we were to look at say,
    well, maybe a more kind of open, green and
  • 23:16 - 23:19
    decentralized web or Internet might look
    like there is actually some lessons we
  • 23:19 - 23:24
    could learn from the energy sector over
    the last, say, 10 to 20 years. So Germany,
  • 23:24 - 23:28
    one thing that we saw was the Energie-
    wende over the last 15 years. And the
  • 23:28 - 23:33
    result of that was that we had like cheap
    green distributed energy. So that we,
  • 23:33 - 23:39
    Germany is interesting in the sense that
    it has quite a heterogeneous grid. So
  • 23:39 - 23:45
    there's lots and lots of smaller providers
    of energy rather than just a handful of
  • 23:45 - 23:50
    huge providers. And there's lots of
    reasons why having a diverse ecosystem is
  • 23:50 - 23:54
    helpful in this, right. And I kind of
    wonder like this is one I share with you
  • 23:54 - 23:57
    as an idea. What if we'd something like
    a digitalwende? Right. What if we could
  • 23:57 - 24:01
    do something like this to, kind of,
    abstract computing away to the point that
  • 24:01 - 24:04
    you can run these in the same way? There
    are companies that are now doing stuff
  • 24:04 - 24:08
    like this right now. And there's one
    company called Helios Exchange that does
  • 24:08 - 24:12
    exactly this. But the paper I showed you
    before, shows you this stuff around there.
  • 24:12 - 24:17
    So this may provide a way away from having
    to rely on just basically an oligopoly and
  • 24:17 - 24:22
    concentrating more power. If we were to
    kind of be prepared to think a bit more
  • 24:22 - 24:28
    about how we run computing around. So
    final thing is, as this possible way of
  • 24:28 - 24:32
    sharing was programing language. So where
    appropriate, you can have an impact here
  • 24:32 - 24:37
    as well, because different languages have
    different goals and that can result in
  • 24:37 - 24:42
    reducing emissions from just much more
    efficient use of resources. So this is
  • 24:42 - 24:46
    Hannes Mehnert yesterday. He was
    presenting some work he's been doing on
  • 24:46 - 24:51
    MirageOS unikernels. All right. And
    whether you probably can't see it. He was
  • 24:51 - 24:54
    basically making the point that this is
    how he used running this stuff before.
  • 24:54 - 25:00
    When he switched to using unikernels, he
    saw memory usage and CPU dropped massively
  • 25:00 - 25:05
    by just having a kind of better use of the
    existing resources. So this was like a 25
  • 25:05 - 25:12
    fold decrease in compute use and a 10
    times decrease in like RAM usage. And you
  • 25:12 - 25:17
    see the same things with other computing,
    other languages. And the nice thing is
  • 25:17 - 25:21
    this is recorded now so you can see it too
    tomorrow. All right. But there's also
  • 25:21 - 25:26
    papers that talk all about this stuff. So
    depending on what your goals might be,
  • 25:26 - 25:31
    there may be certain languages which are
    really better kind of optimized for the
  • 25:31 - 25:35
    task that you might actually have. Now,
    does this mean that I'm saying that we
  • 25:35 - 25:39
    should all go out and code everything in
    Ocaml, C and Rust? No, that's a really,
  • 25:39 - 25:45
    really... we choose languages for a wide
    range of reasons from ecosystem to hiring,
  • 25:45 - 25:49
    to like developer happiness. And when you
    look at a project or a product level,
  • 25:49 - 25:53
    you'll see that these kind of micro
    optimizations, more than fun, might not be
  • 25:53 - 25:57
    the most effective way to achieve some
    emissions reductions. But it's still out
  • 25:57 - 26:01
    there and it's worth being aware of. And
    also, it's worth thinking about if you are
  • 26:01 - 26:06
    able to kind of think about the entire
    stack of tools you might be using, then
  • 26:06 - 26:11
    you're kind of doing something like this
    in many cases. If you say use like Redis
  • 26:11 - 26:16
    or nginx or something to serve things. So
    that's the idea for, like, platform. Now
  • 26:16 - 26:20
    let's talk about packets. So this is...
    I've spoken of infrastructure you control,
  • 26:20 - 26:24
    this is infrastructure you do not control.
    All right? Now, you cannot really control
  • 26:24 - 26:27
    the other parts of the Internet, and
    that's generally considered a good thing.
  • 26:27 - 26:32
    But what you can do is control how much
    data you send over the wire instead, allright.
  • 26:32 - 26:38
    And if we were to kind of look at,
    say, the amount of energy we sent over the
  • 26:38 - 26:42
    wire and we figured out that both sending
    data uses infrastructure, it uses energy,
  • 26:42 - 26:46
    which uses fossil fuels. Then we've got
    some bad news, like we've seen pages
  • 26:46 - 26:51
    growing in size to the point that in
    average they... I think the mean web page
  • 26:51 - 26:55
    size is now larger than the original
    download of Doom. All right. But we're
  • 26:55 - 27:00
    also seeing it, because we have mobile
    phones, so we use this more. All right.
  • 27:00 - 27:03
    And then because cellular network tend to
    use more energy to shift the same amount
  • 27:03 - 27:08
    of data as, say, wired or Wi-Fi networks,
    we have a loss here. So from a kind
  • 27:08 - 27:13
    of energy and climate point of view, this
    is like the worst scenario we can imagine
  • 27:13 - 27:18
    right now. Thankfully, there are this, if
    we think about Web page budgets as
  • 27:18 - 27:22
    basically carbon budgets, we realize we
    have lots of tools that we can repurpose
  • 27:22 - 27:27
    for carbon reductions. So one example is
    Google's Lighthouse. It basically runs
  • 27:27 - 27:31
    checks against your page, then it grades
    you on how well your page is optimized. So
  • 27:31 - 27:35
    what we've been doing at the Green Web
    Foundation is taken Lighthouse, we
  • 27:35 - 27:39
    forked it and we made Greenhouse. Which
    was basically the same idea, but it kind
  • 27:39 - 27:44
    of looks at how many resources you run and
    then says, well, yeah, climate emergency
  • 27:44 - 27:48
    folks, maybe you don't want to get all
    your stuff from fossil fuels. And there's
  • 27:48 - 27:51
    some other things far worse than we can
    make it, kind of, work out the carbon
  • 27:51 - 27:56
    footprint from this, because these numbers
    exist, but that's further down the line.
  • 27:56 - 28:00
    But you can also see that I'm referring to
    the ethical web principles here. If you
  • 28:00 - 28:05
    care about this as a professional, this is
    something that the creators of the web are
  • 28:05 - 28:09
    now saying and giving you license to be
    doing. If you do say, look, I don't want
  • 28:09 - 28:12
    to do this, there is a moral argument for
    doing this. And if I want to build the
  • 28:12 - 28:18
    web, as Tim intended, then you can refer
    back to these ethical principles now for
  • 28:18 - 28:22
    this. But I will need to share with you
    that that doesn't mean that we should just
  • 28:22 - 28:26
    like reader optimize every single web page
    and they'll be fine. Right. It's worth
  • 28:26 - 28:31
    getting a sense of perspective around
    this. All right. Video like, video just
  • 28:31 - 28:35
    dwarfed web traffic. When we think about
    designs, we might make like to give you
  • 28:35 - 28:40
    some context. This chart is just showing
    you an idea of where like usage of
  • 28:40 - 28:45
    like data flows. Right. Now, 60 percent of
    this basically is just telling us that all
  • 28:45 - 28:50
    the video used and streamed is about 300
    kind of megatons of CO2. And that was what
  • 28:50 - 28:54
    it was in 2018, which is roughly the
    carbon footprint of Spain. All right. So
  • 28:54 - 28:58
    all the video = Spain, that's kind of
    numbers and numbers you might want to look
  • 28:58 - 29:02
    at. Now, video on demand like, say,
    Netflix and stuff - just like the country
  • 29:02 - 29:07
    of Chile. Porn - that's like Austria. All
    right. So these are some kind of like
  • 29:07 - 29:13
    reference points is for you to kind of
    refer to now. All right. And I speak about
  • 29:13 - 29:16
    that process now. And like, this is why
    it's worth thinking about some other thing.
  • 29:16 - 29:20
    This is why I also care about kind of making the
    web green, because I think it's going to
  • 29:20 - 29:23
    be easier to make the entire Internet
    green than it is to stop people watching
  • 29:23 - 29:29
    porn, basically, which is a statement, I
    suppose. So I spoke a bit about the
  • 29:29 - 29:35
    process and how there are other things you
    can do outside of computers. All right. So
  • 29:35 - 29:38
    they are obvious. There's two ways I'm
    going to show this. So there's kind of
  • 29:38 - 29:41
    inward looking at process, like the
    greening of how we build digital products.
  • 29:41 - 29:44
    Right. This isn't visible to the end
    users, but it's still a useful thing to
  • 29:44 - 29:51
    do. Now, an example of this is the company
    called WHOLEGRAINDigital. I really admire
  • 29:51 - 29:55
    that. They're really really cool company
    doing some good stuff on the web and they
  • 29:55 - 29:58
    are one of the original kind of WordPress
    agencies and they basically say, yes, we
  • 29:58 - 30:01
    do everything with WordPress and green
    energy and they started working at their
  • 30:01 - 30:08
    own missions and blogging about this. And
    what they said was that they know, that
  • 30:08 - 30:11
    they looked at these figures and they
    switched to running on green infra because
  • 30:11 - 30:14
    that was the kind of right thing for them
    to do. But when I started doing that, they
  • 30:14 - 30:17
    started looking at where else are their
    emissions and what they do. And they
  • 30:17 - 30:20
    basically looked at and some realized
    that, oh, wow, a large part of their
  • 30:20 - 30:23
    emissions just comes from travel. And you
    guys, you can see office and home energy.
  • 30:23 - 30:29
    And of the travel, around 94 percent of
    their emissions came from commuting. So
  • 30:29 - 30:32
    this is why I'm saying that it's more than
    just playing around with computers and
  • 30:32 - 30:38
    optimizing stuff. All right. So this was
    kind of useful and this kind of inspired
  • 30:38 - 30:43
    some of the work agreement foundation for
    us to start sharing this. And what we've
  • 30:43 - 30:49
    been doing recently is basically take this
    model and build some, like I guess in VCC,
  • 30:49 - 30:53
    which is I'm afraid is minimum viable
    carbon calculator, not the post-growth,
  • 30:53 - 30:59
    other kind of acronym there. And we
    basically built like a simple spreadsheet
  • 30:59 - 31:03
    that is very, very fast to fill out. So we
    picked two people to kind of get an idea
  • 31:03 - 31:08
    of, okay. These are the things I'm paying
    to run. This is the like if I build a web
  • 31:08 - 31:12
    project, this is how much data I'm
    shifting over time. And then because it
  • 31:12 - 31:17
    turns out that it uses energy to keep
    people warm and dry inside buildings and
  • 31:17 - 31:21
    people tend to use energy commuting. Then
    we tracked it, we tracked that as well.
  • 31:21 - 31:26
    And we do this to give people some figures
    and get some idea of where they might want
  • 31:26 - 31:31
    to act upon this, because the current ways
    that you report on, say, emissions or
  • 31:31 - 31:34
    think about this is like an annual report
    every year. That's a really, really slow
  • 31:34 - 31:39
    debugging cycle. That means we have like
    eight or nine kind of hits of the F5 key
  • 31:39 - 31:44
    before, like it's a climate apocalypse.
    That feels like we should all do a little
  • 31:44 - 31:48
    better than that. But this is entirely
    open, you can link to the template
  • 31:48 - 31:52
    yourself. And we've we learnt some
    interesting things and we did this. We
  • 31:52 - 31:56
    realized that when we were working on this
    because the team were pretty good on
  • 31:56 - 32:00
    commuting the let them cycle to work. They
    were emissions are quite low there. But we
  • 32:00 - 32:05
    also realized that there was actually an
    argument for changing how we design, say,
  • 32:05 - 32:09
    a Web site. We found that one chunky
    background video, you know, those things
  • 32:09 - 32:13
    that we all hate. Right. That had the same
    carbon footprint as basically the entire
  • 32:13 - 32:18
    team commuting for the entire project. All
    right. So it's quite easy to make an
  • 32:18 - 32:23
    argument to get rid of that and it kind of
    meaningful, measurable reduction there. So
  • 32:23 - 32:28
    these are some of the stuff that we do now
    in this. The other thing is an outward
  • 32:28 - 32:33
    process. So these might be decisions you
    make that affect the kind of emissions
  • 32:33 - 32:37
    through use or for your end users. And
    these are gonna be much more visible to
  • 32:37 - 32:42
    end users. The example I like to refer to,
    because I'm a fan of the company. is
  • 32:42 - 32:46
    Fairphone. You folks have heard a
    Fairphone here, right? Yeah. Like they're
  • 32:46 - 32:49
    basically the canonical Fairtrade smart
    smartphone, really. All right. That's the
  • 32:49 - 32:52
    best way to describe them. And they
    also... there's lots of good things about
  • 32:52 - 32:56
    what they do, but they also share lots of
    information about their own carbon
  • 32:56 - 32:59
    emissions and what steps they're trying to
    take to reduce them in a relatively honest
  • 32:59 - 33:03
    way, which is also really good. And
    because they publish it, we can read it.
  • 33:03 - 33:08
    Now, we've seen trends in electronics over
    the last, say, five or six years where we
  • 33:08 - 33:12
    had modular things and we saw a few failed
    attempts at having modular smartphones.
  • 33:12 - 33:16
    We've been a shift towards like systems on
    a chip and stuff like that. So if you are
  • 33:16 - 33:20
    going to do that, that means in some way
    that having a modular design is a
  • 33:20 - 33:25
    challenge. But it means that if most of
    the energy or impact on building
  • 33:25 - 33:30
    electronics is coming from basically
    turning sand into a chip with lots, lots
  • 33:30 - 33:34
    of energy then we'll need to think about
    where we might have a way to decouple this
  • 33:34 - 33:39
    from the rest of it. All right. To make us
    the electronics we do have last longer.
  • 33:39 - 33:45
    All right. And this is what I found in
    there, over LCA life CO2-analysis report,
  • 33:45 - 33:49
    where they look at the emissions over the
    entire process. They... basically the
  • 33:49 - 33:53
    first thing is their actual use is pretty
    small for this. But what you can see here
  • 33:53 - 34:00
    - the emissions were from the production.
    And the thing they decide to do was make
  • 34:00 - 34:07
    the phone as easy as possible to repair
    for end users or replace parts of it. To
  • 34:07 - 34:10
    make it go from, say, a 5-years project
    product to a sort... from a 3-years
  • 34:10 - 34:13
    product to a 5-years product. And this had
    the impact of reducing the emissions by a
  • 34:13 - 34:18
    measurable figure. And it's a pattern that
    we might follow ourselves. All right. Now,
  • 34:18 - 34:21
    actually. Fairphone and it make a real
    feature of this now, they've talked about
  • 34:21 - 34:27
    this to their, kind of, audience. So they
    basically say if you can just say upgrade
  • 34:27 - 34:31
    just the camera rather than the rest of
    the phone, that is still kind of working,
  • 34:31 - 34:34
    then you can reduce the carbon footprint
    over the lifetime by these kind of
  • 34:34 - 34:38
    figures. And I think this is actually
    worth sharing because it hints that there
  • 34:38 - 34:42
    are options for us to actually be doing
    something until we can run everything on
  • 34:42 - 34:47
    green power, which would affect these
    numbers. And I think I've shared with you
  • 34:47 - 34:52
    like a mental model and see how it can be
    activated. I've spoken with you about kind
  • 34:52 - 34:56
    of carbon. Now I'm just gonna give you
    some steps of where to go next. So, okay.
  • 34:56 - 35:02
    It's 2020. Right. And I kind of feel this
    feels like this table stakes. And I'm
  • 35:02 - 35:05
    really glad that at least one person is
    taking photos of this. I'd really like it,
  • 35:05 - 35:09
    if more of you to take some photos of this
    and share with your peers, because I think
  • 35:09 - 35:13
    the single most effective thing we can use
    in community is stuff like this. All
  • 35:13 - 35:15
    right. We would expect we need to kind of
    make this just... we need to change the
  • 35:15 - 35:19
    static about how we build things. So in
    the same way that we would expect a
  • 35:19 - 35:22
    builder to know about asbestos and we
    expect automotive engineers to know about
  • 35:22 - 35:26
    lead poisoning in particulars. I think as
    professionals we need to know about the
  • 35:26 - 35:30
    impact of carbon and what we do and that
    we don't need it to build digital
  • 35:30 - 35:33
    services. And I think if we can build
    electric cars in the automotive center,
  • 35:33 - 35:36
    then we can build green stacks in
    technology. And I think we need this to
  • 35:36 - 35:40
    become the norm. So this is what I need. I
    need your help me to share this with your
  • 35:40 - 35:43
    boss, with your coworker. Set something
    like this. We've had people talk about
  • 35:43 - 35:48
    just how bad the situation is. And like
    this is really like one of the minimum
  • 35:48 - 35:53
    things we can do. Which doesn't actually
    have a massive cost for us, as you do. So
  • 35:53 - 35:57
    if we do, we need something like a cloud
    moonshot to get off fossil fuels. And this
  • 35:57 - 36:02
    is one thing I really would ask you to
    really consider. So asking for this is a
  • 36:02 - 36:07
    bit easier if you have friends. So I'm in
    a group called ClimateAction.tech, where
  • 36:07 - 36:11
    it's basically just a slack group with a
    few other things that we now run from
  • 36:11 - 36:14
    here, on meet ups. And the idea is that we
    do this to kind of share what the
  • 36:14 - 36:18
    strategies are to actually kind of push
    for this kind of stuff, because not
  • 36:18 - 36:22
    everyone can join Extinction Rebellion.
    And I'm not sure that everyone should join
  • 36:22 - 36:28
    Extinction Rebellion. They used that we
    have different aspects of ourselves that
  • 36:28 - 36:33
    we bring in our work compared to where
    else we might work. Now if you are
  • 36:33 - 36:38
    interested in acting upon any of this. I
    work at Agreement Foundation and we
  • 36:38 - 36:41
    provide, we have like an open source
    platform where you can check your stack
  • 36:41 - 36:47
    and then the tools you have to do this.
    And if you are interested about any of
  • 36:47 - 36:51
    this stuff, we are trying to find a way to
    make it easier or to make some of this
  • 36:51 - 36:54
    much more transparent, because I shared
    with you before about how large companies
  • 36:54 - 36:59
    can basically fudge some of the numbers to
    make them look greener than they otherwise
  • 36:59 - 37:04
    might be. So tomorrow we're running a kind
    of on lecture room M2. We're running
  • 37:04 - 37:06
    something like a workshop to figure out
    what some of this might look like in the
  • 37:06 - 37:12
    same way that we set up robots.txt. So
    carbon.txt a way to verify this. There's a
  • 37:12 - 37:15
    Web site that that's been hastily put
    together to give you some idea for this.
  • 37:15 - 37:19
    And finally, I'm just gonna wrap up now.
    Thank you for letting me talk to you about
  • 37:19 - 37:24
    this stuff here. If you're interested in
    getting in touch and talk to me, please do
  • 37:24 - 37:29
    the Green Web Foundation. I'm Mr. Chris
    Adams on Twitter and GitHub. We're asked
  • 37:29 - 37:33
    to do some training around this because we
    realize that although most of us do care,
  • 37:33 - 37:39
    we don't have much ways to act upon this
    kind of stuff. Then finally, if you find
  • 37:39 - 37:42
    this interesting, there's a newsletter
    which I've started with a friend of mine,
  • 37:42 - 37:45
    Martin, where we're basically sharing what
    we learn as we go through it, which bits
  • 37:45 - 37:52
    are hard, which bits aren't so hard. And
    yeah. Thank you everyone!
  • 37:52 - 38:02
    applause
  • 38:02 - 38:08
    Herald: Thank you very much. We do have
    plenty of time for Q&A. Nonetheless, I
  • 38:08 - 38:14
    would like the Q&A to be of high quality.
    So when you ask a question, it should be a
  • 38:14 - 38:19
    question. Thanking the speaker is lovely
    and nice, but don't waste our collective
  • 38:19 - 38:24
    bandwidth on that and do that afterwards
    on your own. And I don't really care what
  • 38:24 - 38:28
    your name is or what your affiliation is.
    Just ask a question, and make it short and
  • 38:28 - 38:30
    so on. And the first two questions go to
    the Internet.
  • 38:30 - 38:36
    Signal Angel: You've mentioned the preview
    for other workshop, a carbon.txt just now.
  • 38:36 - 38:41
    Can you already share some strategies how,
    for example, the Green Web Foundation and
  • 38:41 - 38:46
    other sites directories can protect
    themselves against being abused by
  • 38:46 - 38:48
    companies, for example, through
    greenwashing.
  • 38:48 - 38:55
    Chris: So I think... you just need to read
    some reports about this kind of stuff. And
  • 38:55 - 38:59
    get familiar with this. Now, I really
    apologize - a large bunch of this was
  • 38:59 - 39:02
    incredibly dry. There was lots and lots of
    dry material around this to, actually,
  • 39:02 - 39:07
    figure this stuff out. I think it's mainly
    a case of working out what numbers you...
  • 39:07 - 39:10
    what questions you might actually have to
    ask. And I can share a link specifically
  • 39:10 - 39:14
    for the questions that you need to ask.
    But generally, I think the four things I
  • 39:14 - 39:20
    would look for: if the organization hasn't
    made a public statement about when they're
  • 39:20 - 39:24
    going to hit zero emissions; if they're
    not sharing their progress on an annual
  • 39:24 - 39:32
    basis; if they're not sharing how much of
    their business they get from basically the
  • 39:32 - 39:36
    from fossil fuels right now; then how much
    of their business is still involved in
  • 39:36 - 39:40
    extracting fossil fuels from the ground. I
    think these are the key things and if
  • 39:40 - 39:43
    they're not using this kind of scoped
    emissions process, which is a clear thing
  • 39:43 - 39:48
    of finding numbers, those are the biggest
    ones. There is a page on that I've got
  • 39:48 - 39:52
    which lists these questions to ask and
    I'll share link to everyone since I get on
  • 39:52 - 39:59
    the webs to link to this.
    Signal Angel: And the second question from
  • 39:59 - 40:04
    IRC: The numbers that you've mentioned
    that the companies themselves publish. Can
  • 40:04 - 40:08
    you verify them? And if yes, how?
    Chris: So the thing that you can... Oh,
  • 40:08 - 40:10
    that's the thing is - independent
    verification is the thing you need to ask
  • 40:10 - 40:13
    for, it's the final one. So I have just
    finally seen where the voice is coming
  • 40:13 - 40:17
    from. It's like the voice of God speaking.
    The independent verification is very
  • 40:17 - 40:24
    important. All the examples I pointed to,
    had independent verification, usually from
  • 40:24 - 40:29
    a set of companies that do auditing of
    this kind of stuff. Now there is again,
  • 40:29 - 40:32
    there's a firewall of tedium around this
    stuff, like that thing where I showed you
  • 40:32 - 40:37
    with a Google with Google's numbers being
    high and low. This is because you need to
  • 40:37 - 40:40
    kind of go into the minutiae of
    understanding market based reporting,
  • 40:40 - 40:42
    because location based reporting and
    there's reporting around this stuff,
  • 40:42 - 40:46
    there's like lots of academic literature,
    but there's just not very accessible to
  • 40:46 - 40:52
    lots of people right now. They need to be
    more of us who do do this stuff. This is
  • 40:52 - 40:55
    partly one of the reasons we want to have
    something like carbon.txt was to basically
  • 40:55 - 40:59
    give people a chance to see this, but also
    linked to the specific documentation
  • 40:59 - 41:04
    they're referring to. So you can ask.
    Okay. So it's nice you've done this. But
  • 41:04 - 41:06
    whereas this was a third party
    verification of this or why is the same
  • 41:06 - 41:11
    guy called Trevor being basically audited
    all of these companies and like literally
  • 41:11 - 41:15
    it's the same dude who's reported Amazon's
    and Apple's. And I'm not sure about
  • 41:15 - 41:19
    Google. Right. But Trevor is probably a
    good guy. But the fact that there is only
  • 41:19 - 41:24
    one person doing this is kind of...
    come on, we know that there are things that
  • 41:24 - 41:29
    you probably don't want to do in this
    field. Also in Europe, at least, if you
  • 41:29 - 41:32
    want to sell renewable energy, you do need
    to register this with the government
  • 41:32 - 41:37
    registry. And there is something in
    there... I didn't really talk about this
  • 41:37 - 41:41
    in the session. The aim is talk about more
    in carbon.txt, how to find this and how to
  • 41:41 - 41:46
    look this up. Basically, everything we
    know about SSL and DNS, you can apply that
  • 41:46 - 41:50
    to solve this kind of problem without
    needing a freaking block chain. All right.
  • 41:50 - 41:53
    And you can actually find something useful
    here, right? Like this data is out there.
  • 41:53 - 41:56
    It's just the we need to better know the
    right questions to ask and make sure that,
  • 41:56 - 42:00
    well, we are running stuff on a green
    stack rather than a brown stack.
  • 42:00 - 42:04
    Herald: Ok. Microphone number 6, state
    your question.
  • 42:04 - 42:08
    Mic6: Hello and thanks. Very good. Thanks
    for your great talk.
  • 42:08 - 42:11
    Herald: I've said something about thanking
    the speaker before.
  • 42:11 - 42:15
    Mic6: I know. That's why I said it. I
    understand you could try to convince
  • 42:15 - 42:20
    people to reduce their carbon emissions.
    Now the managers I have been working under
  • 42:20 - 42:26
    are generally good in reducing cost. Do
    you think it would help to translate
  • 42:26 - 42:32
    carbon emissions into cost and have this
    problem solved by the invisible hand?
  • 42:32 - 42:37
    Chris: So this is actually the approach
    that Amazon use. And for some of the
  • 42:37 - 42:41
    spreadsheets I've showed you before where
    we do not have numbers forecast for
  • 42:41 - 42:45
    emission, for reported emissions, the best
    thing you can go on is going to be sector
  • 42:45 - 42:51
    level averages for the carbon intensity of
    spending a 1000 pounds or 1000 euros in a
  • 42:51 - 42:56
    particular area. So you might look at it
    like that. I kind of feel that there are
  • 42:56 - 43:02
    certain people who really respond to this
    kind of like cost base messaging. But I
  • 43:02 - 43:06
    think it's more attractive for us to kind
    of change the aesthetic around what we do
  • 43:06 - 43:10
    so rather than us continually striving. I
    mean, if we had the narrative for people
  • 43:10 - 43:14
    for our generation was to basically save
    the planet, that feels a much more
  • 43:14 - 43:19
    attractive thing than using cost. But I
    do... I'm aware that if you are in an
  • 43:19 - 43:25
    organization where the primary driver is
    cost, then you need to be able to use that
  • 43:25 - 43:28
    language. And that's why we've been
    speaking about some of that. But there are
  • 43:28 - 43:34
    lots and lots... there's actually stuff in
    this field to show this. There are
  • 43:34 - 43:38
    organizations that will basically help you
    quantify the risks from doing nothing
  • 43:38 - 43:42
    versus the cost of action. Because in many
    cases, when we talk about this, we think
  • 43:42 - 43:47
    that we often use... you hear the phrase:
    "Well, what's it going to cost to shift to
  • 43:47 - 43:52
    kind of green energy?", for example. But
    it's like - what we pretend is there is no
  • 43:52 - 43:57
    cost to inaction, when it really, really
    is. And we've seen just the five years
  • 43:57 - 44:01
    massive, massive changes in the
    destruction of companies and industries
  • 44:01 - 44:07
    and, well, hundreds and hundreds of lives
    as well. So I think that you can use costs
  • 44:07 - 44:12
    for this, but I think it's a bit reductive
    to only use costs.
  • 44:12 - 44:20
    Herald: Shall be microphone number 2.
    Mic2: You in your research, did you
  • 44:20 - 44:26
    encounter a tradeoff between privacy and
    security and carbon neutrality? And if
  • 44:26 - 44:31
    yes, in which cases?
    Chris: Yes. In fact, I used to work at a
  • 44:31 - 44:36
    company, Amy. One of the key ideas behind
    the company was that if you can understand
  • 44:36 - 44:39
    the company's CO2 emissions, you can
    understand the supply chain. And if you
  • 44:39 - 44:43
    understand the supply chain, then in some
    ways you can use it as a kind of cost to
  • 44:43 - 44:47
    kind of beaten organization to reduce
    their prices, because you can see that
  • 44:47 - 44:51
    they're much more wasteful compared to
    other ones. But at the same time, this
  • 44:51 - 44:56
    is... so that works at an organizational
    level. There's also a personal aspect to
  • 44:56 - 45:01
    this. And I think that this is a field
    that in many cases is focusing on
  • 45:01 - 45:07
    individual action and kind of shaming
    people has been proven not to be very,
  • 45:07 - 45:09
    very effective. But that doesn't mean that
    you shouldn't do anything, that there
  • 45:09 - 45:14
    isn't a cause for individual action,
    because I think that provides the cover
  • 45:14 - 45:17
    for politicians to make the decisions
    which will result in kind of real
  • 45:17 - 45:22
    meaningful changes. So there is a
    tradeoff, because in order for you to
  • 45:22 - 45:26
    understand emissions, because basically
    emissions are essentially a proxy for
  • 45:26 - 45:31
    activity and you will usually see this and
    there are plenty of stories around this
  • 45:31 - 45:35
    and hopefully there might even be a topic
    about this specific subject on Republica,
  • 45:35 - 45:40
    in May. Because, yeah, there is lots of
    interesting literature around this
  • 45:40 - 45:45
    tradeoff that we do actually have to make.
    Herald: Microphone number 1.
  • 45:45 - 45:51
    Mic1: Hi. Can you make an educated guess
    on how much emissions could be spared if
  • 45:51 - 45:57
    like the big providers would follow your
    advice?
  • 45:57 - 46:03
    Chris: So I guess it's tied to the, you
    know... I've showed you the numbers of
  • 46:03 - 46:07
    Google like that different kind of charts.
    Right. You could make the list, kind of
  • 46:07 - 46:13
    like coyork??... just cheat argument. You
    say, well, maybe all of it. Right. But I
  • 46:13 - 46:17
    don't think that's really accurate.
    Generally, if we are looking at just the
  • 46:17 - 46:20
    CO2 emissions from just like running the
    Internet, right. I reckon you could
  • 46:20 - 46:31
    probably wipe out two thirds to 80 percent
    of it, what actually depends on where you
  • 46:31 - 46:35
    might be looking at this, actually. So
    more than half comfortably. All right.
  • 46:35 - 46:42
    Because if you look at, say, data centers,
    the main driver there, the main source of
  • 46:42 - 46:46
    emissions is from them being on 24/7,
    continually use like three quarters of the
  • 46:46 - 46:50
    emissions, assuming that data centers are
    full of servers which are used for three
  • 46:50 - 46:55
    to five years, which is common. I'm not
    sure this is the case. Please talk to me
  • 46:55 - 46:57
    if that's not the case, because I hear
    rumors that that might not be the case at
  • 46:57 - 47:01
    large companies, but no one will write
    this down. So until you know that I can't
  • 47:01 - 47:05
    give you a really educated, a really kind
    of better guess than that, but it'll be
  • 47:05 - 47:09
    lovely to find out if that data exists and
    there are lot of hackers who might get to
  • 47:09 - 47:13
    know about this kind of stuff.
    Herald: Microphone number 4.
  • 47:13 - 47:17
    Mic4: When you talk about moving
    computation around the globe, basically
  • 47:17 - 47:20
    cause to the weather. I wonder if there
    isn't a lot of overhead associated with
  • 47:20 - 47:23
    that, like additional communication. Maybe
    if you know, you're far away from a
  • 47:23 - 47:26
    database, you need rooting hops or
    whatsoever. Do you know anything about
  • 47:26 - 47:29
    that?
    Chris: Yes, I spoke to the guy to Alan
  • 47:29 - 47:35
    James, who was actually working on that.
    And I said, hey - what you said, I said,
  • 47:35 - 47:39
    yeah, we take that into account because we
    can work out the emissions from moving a
  • 47:39 - 47:44
    container of this size to over there. And
    in many cases, we might move to the state
  • 47:44 - 47:48
    that we watch you when a query there as
    well. So his approach was to basically
  • 47:48 - 47:53
    apply various kinds of metadata tags to
    the kind of jobs you might want to run to
  • 47:53 - 47:58
    provide this kind of flexibility. And this
    is not new idea like a Mastodon ... is a
  • 47:58 - 48:00
    kind of data science company that started
    doing something like this 10 years ago.
  • 48:00 - 48:06
    They're kind of the ... Green Cloud
    people doing this kind of stuff. And even
  • 48:06 - 48:09
    before then, there's this phrase called
    "chasing the moon". Where was this idea that
  • 48:09 - 48:14
    you can do this if you run stuff on the
    dark side of Earth, which sounds super
  • 48:14 - 48:19
    metal. Right. There is... this is not a
    new concept, really, but it is cool.
  • 48:19 - 48:26
    Herald: Microphone number five, please.
    Mic5: Hi. Do you see any chance of getting
  • 48:26 - 48:30
    governmental support with this, for
    example, like with tax cuts for electronic
  • 48:30 - 48:33
    cars? I mean, maybe it would be possible
    in here, too.
  • 48:33 - 48:38
    Chris: Yes. I was actually at the EU
    Commission Green Public Procurement
  • 48:38 - 48:42
    workshops. They've been doing for the last
    like few months. And I was... there were a
  • 48:42 - 48:45
    tiny number of people from small
    companies. There were lots of large, large
  • 48:45 - 48:48
    companies who were there saying, yes, they
    think you should do is move to our cloud.
  • 48:48 - 48:53
    That's the clear solution to the climate
    crisis. But they actually, it does look
  • 48:53 - 48:59
    like there is guidance and there is going
    to be support in this field. All right. So
  • 48:59 - 49:02
    I do know there's going to be... well,
    we've already seen this like we've seen
  • 49:02 - 49:06
    the European Parliament declare climate
    emergency saying: we need to halve
  • 49:06 - 49:13
    emissions by 2030. That's around 8%, year
    on year for the next 10 years. Now, most
  • 49:13 - 49:17
    of us don't know what that looks like
    because the last time you saw 8% drop in a
  • 49:17 - 49:21
    single year was the collapse of the Soviet
    Union. Which is partly why I'm kind of
  • 49:21 - 49:25
    sharing stuff like this, because I think
    the idea of having a more managed
  • 49:25 - 49:31
    reduction of emissions feels more kind of
    conducive to I guess a kind of
  • 49:31 - 49:37
    continuities of how we live than the
    collapse of the Soviet Union. So I think
  • 49:37 - 49:40
    there is stuff out there. But in many
    cases, we don't have the knowledge right
  • 49:40 - 49:44
    now as people in the sector to know what
    is effective. And this is something that
  • 49:44 - 49:49
    we need to, as professionals, learn, to
    learn where the levers are if we want to
  • 49:49 - 49:55
    consider ourselves as professionals facing
    the scale of the challenge that is ahead
  • 49:55 - 50:00
    of us.
    Herald: Microphone number two, please.
  • 50:00 - 50:05
    Mic2: Hello. So my question is about you
    talked a lot about how much a carbon
  • 50:05 - 50:10
    emission happens because of running a
    server in the server side. But if the
  • 50:10 - 50:14
    traffic goes really, really high in a real
    larger scale, you might have a lots of
  • 50:14 - 50:17
    emission just because of their
    transmitting the package through the
  • 50:17 - 50:26
    datacenter from and ... and backbones plus
    like there carbon emission from rendering
  • 50:26 - 50:31
    the page in the like formZ and everything
    around that. Is there... I was looking for
  • 50:31 - 50:35
    it for a while, but I couldn't find a
    number like saying okay, one TB of traffic
  • 50:35 - 50:40
    in the data center from United States
    going to cause like this much of carbon.
  • 50:40 - 50:45
    Chris: Yeah. Is that your question? What
    is the carbon footprint of a gigabyte of
  • 50:45 - 50:47
    data or something?
    Mic2: I want to have some numbers saying
  • 50:47 - 50:51
    like which one is like translate traffic
    to a number.
  • 50:51 - 50:54
    Chris: Okay. So there are two
    organizations who are doing some work in
  • 50:54 - 50:59
    this field. In fact, there's a whole kind
    of community around greener web
  • 50:59 - 51:05
    performance where they are tracking this
    kind of stuff now. There's a group called
  • 51:05 - 51:07
    the Shift Project, who I've referenced
    before, who talk about the carbon
  • 51:07 - 51:11
    footprint... the video being the carbon
    footprint of Spain. They've actually got
  • 51:11 - 51:14
    some browser extensions which you can
    install into Firefox. I'll give you
  • 51:14 - 51:18
    numbers as you browse to see this. I've
    also put together just like some
  • 51:18 - 51:22
    interactive notebooks, you can get some
    ballpark figures of this kind of stuff
  • 51:22 - 51:25
    yourself. So very quickly, you can decide,
    well, do I do this or do I do something
  • 51:25 - 51:30
    different. So, yes, look at Green Web
    Foundation, there's a link specifically to
  • 51:30 - 51:36
    a notebook with the numbers for this.
    Herald: Next question goes to the
  • 51:36 - 51:39
    Internet.
    Signal Angel: Hey, IRC states that in
  • 51:39 - 51:45
    their experience, Kubernetes has a quite a
    high CPU idle usage, about 40 percent as
  • 51:45 - 51:51
    mentioned. This mechanism that you showed
    to adapt the server usage to the demand.
  • 51:51 - 51:55
    Does this mitigate against this?
    Chris: I don't really know enough about
  • 51:55 - 52:02
    Kubernetes to give a useful opinion on
    Kubernetes. So my thing was like this is
  • 52:02 - 52:08
    an interesting idea because it's treating
    cloud and compute like a utility. And as a
  • 52:08 - 52:13
    result, we see patterns that we've seen
    that have success in other sectors. But
  • 52:13 - 52:15
    that could be applied to us. I don't know
    beyond that, but I can tell you that
  • 52:15 - 52:20
    there's a lot of well, there's basically
    funding going into this kind of stuff now.
  • 52:20 - 52:24
    But I'm sorry, I don't know much more than
    that. But if you do work with Kubernetes,
  • 52:24 - 52:27
    please you talk to me because I would be
    really nice to have a better answer than I
  • 52:27 - 52:32
    don't know in future.
    Herald: Microphone number three.
  • 52:32 - 52:37
    Mic3: How many talks do I have to attend
    here? So that it will have been worth it
  • 52:37 - 52:41
    traveling here from Munich instead of
    watching this online.
  • 52:41 - 52:47
    Chris: So it depends what... Okay. First
    of all, I think coming to a conference,
  • 52:47 - 52:51
    just because there's talks, that's not the
    reason to come to a conference. You come
  • 52:51 - 52:54
    to a conference to have high quality, high
    context conversations with other people
  • 52:54 - 52:58
    and get something useful from that,
    because like you said, you don't need to
  • 52:58 - 53:01
    do that. That said, the idea of like
    having kind of physical community is
  • 53:01 - 53:06
    actually very, very useful. I think that
    there isn't a number, I can't say like
  • 53:06 - 53:11
    seven because that's going to be
    meaningless. But there is a whole issue
  • 53:11 - 53:16
    around basically the carbon footprint of
    traveling to events and in many cases, so
  • 53:16 - 53:22
    for some context: I was organizing a
    conference in London called Helping
  • 53:22 - 53:25
    Organize your Conference called Map Camp,
    and we were trying to internalize the
  • 53:25 - 53:29
    carbon costs of people traveling, and we
    found that some basically a minority of
  • 53:29 - 53:34
    people coming across the Atlantic Ocean
    wiped out, I think, by half the carbon
  • 53:34 - 53:38
    footprint, the kind of carbon budget for a
    600 person conference. So there is some
  • 53:38 - 53:42
    numbers around that. We've actually hired
    a group to give to actually publish some
  • 53:42 - 53:47
    of this information out there. And there's
    a couple of widgets to figure this stuff
  • 53:47 - 53:52
    out. But if you're here for the talks,
    that's one thing. But really, you should
  • 53:52 - 53:57
    be here to make speak to the other people
    and get some kind of meaningful connection
  • 53:57 - 54:01
    you can have from there.
    Herald: Microphone number one.
  • 54:01 - 54:09
    Mic1: Is this possible to create like an
    automated way, a platform or service that
  • 54:09 - 54:14
    tech companies can connect to and
    estimate, like have a rough estimate about
  • 54:14 - 54:19
    the carbon footprint based on the stack
    they use, based on the bandwidth, based on
  • 54:19 - 54:23
    the, you know, different process
    information.
  • 54:23 - 54:29
    Chris: It depends. This relies on the
    organization having access to the matrix
  • 54:29 - 54:33
    that will go in as an input. So garbage
    in, garbage out. Right. So the spreadsheet
  • 54:33 - 54:37
    I pointed to gives you a very, very low
    quality version of doing that. There's
  • 54:37 - 54:43
    also a tool called AWS Green Cost
    Explorer. We've basically forked a diverse
  • 54:43 - 54:47
    cost. AWS Cost Explorer worked out which
    ones, which regions are running on fossil
  • 54:47 - 54:50
    fuels and then we present that information
    back to you so you can get some idea for
  • 54:50 - 54:56
    this so you can work out these numbers.
    But I don't see them right now, largely
  • 54:56 - 55:00
    because a lot of organizations see this
    information is commercially sensitive. So
  • 55:00 - 55:04
    they don't like to share this. So we have
    to go on basically kind of some rough
  • 55:04 - 55:08
    numbers here. And this is one of the
    problems that we do have. And that came up
  • 55:08 - 55:12
    with the grim public procurement thing was
    that we don't have the transparency right
  • 55:12 - 55:17
    now to make the particular informed
    decisions about this. But theoretically,
  • 55:17 - 55:21
    yes.
    Herald: Microphone number five.
  • 55:21 - 55:28
    Mic5: Hi. I have a question about this
    double things that you are doing. On one
  • 55:28 - 55:31
    side, you have the getting things done
    like building sustainable infrastructure.
  • 55:31 - 55:36
    And in the last days, yesterday, there was
    a couple of examples of that. And on the
  • 55:36 - 55:40
    other side is generate momentum like
    convincing people to join the movement and
  • 55:40 - 55:46
    be more aware of that. So I was wondering,
    how does, for example, the Green Web
  • 55:46 - 55:53
    Foundation apply to that? In the sense
    then how radical can you be like, can you
  • 55:53 - 55:59
    kick out people from your directory
    because you think they are not doing green
  • 55:59 - 56:03
    enough? Or how does this work?
    Chris: So I should be clear about the
  • 56:03 - 56:07
    Green Web Foundation just being a handful
    of guys. It's not a big thing at all.
  • 56:07 - 56:12
    Right. So it's been running for about 10
    years. And this is a thing that we have
  • 56:12 - 56:16
    been doing for the last six months. I
    mean, I joined in March and we started
  • 56:16 - 56:20
    looking through this and we are basically
    now, we've been contacting our providers
  • 56:20 - 56:25
    and say: look, we need you to provide some
    more useful and some more rigorous data
  • 56:25 - 56:31
    evidence to back up your green claims. For
    this reason, because you can't...
  • 56:31 - 56:35
    basically, it's as the stakes are got
    higher, it's become more and more
  • 56:35 - 56:38
    important to actually do this. And if
    you're going to base decisions about how
  • 56:38 - 56:43
    you kind of choose infrastructure from now
    on, it makes a lot of sense to do that. So
  • 56:43 - 56:47
    we are heading in that direction to say,
    look, if you can't share this information,
  • 56:47 - 56:53
    we're going to stop listing you. But we
    have given, because we're not so sure
  • 56:53 - 56:59
    ourselves in this, we we're giving people
    a deadline to get this information. So you
  • 56:59 - 57:03
    probably see some the stats change over
    the coming weeks as the way that we do our
  • 57:03 - 57:07
    reporting changes. But because we released
    open data sets around this on a regular
  • 57:07 - 57:13
    basis, you can actually see this.
    Herald: Microphone number two.
  • 57:13 - 57:19
    Mic2: Hey, have you heard about the
    Science Based Targets initiative? And if
  • 57:19 - 57:21
    yes, what do you think of them?
    Chris: So Science Based Targets is
  • 57:21 - 57:26
    interesting because they are one of the
    drivers to basic... So if you're not
  • 57:26 - 57:30
    familiar what Science Based Targets are:
    Science Based Targets are basically a way
  • 57:30 - 57:34
    to say, well, if you're an organization
    and you want to hit net zero, the science
  • 57:34 - 57:39
    dictates that you need to take these steps
    here. I actually think they're better than
  • 57:39 - 57:42
    nothing in a lot of cases and I think
    they're probably one of the more effective
  • 57:42 - 57:47
    things to use. And they also insist that
    you do need to understand emissions in
  • 57:47 - 57:51
    your supply chain. So I imagine
    organizations that sign up to Science
  • 57:51 - 57:55
    Based Targets will come on pump against
    the problems that I've just explained
  • 57:55 - 58:00
    about, trying to get numbers from the
    large companies who tend to be coy about
  • 58:00 - 58:06
    sharing this stuff. I think it makes total
    sense at corporate level. If you're not a
  • 58:06 - 58:12
    state body. But I feel that the legally
    binding targets that are now in place in
  • 58:12 - 58:17
    the U.K. and we are likely to see in
    Europe in the next six months to a year,
  • 58:17 - 58:21
    would be greater levers, because they
    provide a degree of certainty for people
  • 58:21 - 58:26
    to then justify decisions. Because it's
    the law now, rather than being a thing
  • 58:26 - 58:31
    that you might get unemployed for.
    Herald: Question from the Internet.
  • 58:31 - 58:36
    Signal Angel: You mentioned that video on
    the Internet is a large majority of the
  • 58:36 - 58:42
    energy usage. Can you say something about
    how this breaks down to encoding, storage,
  • 58:42 - 58:46
    transmission and decoding?
    Chris: Yes. Those numbers, I understand,
  • 58:46 - 58:51
    are all about just the transfer. So I
    don't think there is much about the
  • 58:51 - 58:53
    encoding parts on that. That's just
    sending.
  • 58:53 - 58:58
    Signal Angel: And quick follow up: can you
    approximately say how much people can save
  • 58:58 - 59:03
    by, for example, staying on single
    definition or SD instead of HD?
  • 59:03 - 59:09
    Chris: I... was it four times? I don't
    know what that the change in resolution
  • 59:09 - 59:14
    would be and it's not something I feel
    comfortable showing numbers on, because I
  • 59:14 - 59:19
    basically be making up on the spot. I feel
    that the solution is telling people to not
  • 59:19 - 59:24
    do something like this - I think it's
    really, really hard ask and seriously,
  • 59:24 - 59:29
    speeding? Getting off fossil fuels is a
    much better way to solve this problem than
  • 59:29 - 59:33
    telling people they're not allowed to
    watch Netflix ever again or only in low
  • 59:33 - 59:38
    resolution, for example. Like we like
    technology because we're like 15000 people
  • 59:38 - 59:42
    here because we like technology. Telling
    everyone you don't get to use technology
  • 59:42 - 59:46
    anymore is gonna be much, much harder to
    sell than just use green power and stop
  • 59:46 - 59:50
    running fossil fuels.
    Herald: Okay. Last question goes to
  • 59:50 - 59:53
    microphone number one.
    Mic1: Hello. I work for a company that...
  • 59:53 - 59:57
    Herald: I've said something about
    affiliations and introductions. Stage your
  • 59:57 - 60:02
    question? We're pretty much out of time.
    Mic1: If a company owns a lot of servers
  • 60:02 - 60:10
    and the only solution to reduce the carbon
    footprint was to switch to green energy,
  • 60:10 - 60:17
    this would increase the costs for the
    energy. And I'm afraid that I don't have
  • 60:17 - 60:26
    good arguments to go to ask them to switch
    to green energy because of the costs.
  • 60:26 - 60:31
    Chris: Green energy is cheaper than fossil
    fuel energy now, like ... so, we've seen
  • 60:31 - 60:34
    this massive reduction in costs like a
    like storage has come down by 85 percent
  • 60:34 - 60:39
    in the last say 10 years, we've seen a
    massive drop in renewables, like this
  • 60:39 - 60:44
    argument is kind of being solved at that
    level there. It's a choice of provider or
  • 60:44 - 60:48
    something separate. But I think in many
    cases it's going to be a case of choosing
  • 60:48 - 60:51
    who you want to do that. And if you're
    trying to make this argument here, you can
  • 60:51 - 60:56
    make the argument that generally people
    tend to want to work in companies that are
  • 60:56 - 61:00
    not destroying the planet. And if you want
    to retain people or attract new people
  • 61:00 - 61:04
    saying, hi, we're part of the solution,
    not the problem is a good way to present
  • 61:04 - 61:08
    this. And that's why lots of organizations
    talk about kind of green credentials
  • 61:08 - 61:12
    because it's a recruiting tool in the same
    way that they talk about open source or
  • 61:12 - 61:15
    working from home or anything like that,
    especially as we get older and have more
  • 61:15 - 61:20
    kids and then realize that: wow, they'll
    be alive when this stuff happens! Okay.
  • 61:20 - 61:23
    Herald: Thank you so much. We're out of
    time.
  • 61:23 - 61:24
    applause
  • 61:24 - 61:25
    36C3 postroll music
  • 61:25 - 61:54
    Subtitles created by c3subtitles.de
    in the year 2021. Join, and help us!
Title:
36C3 - Reducing Carbon in the Digital Realm
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Video Language:
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Duration:
01:01:54

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