Green Information Technology

About: Green Information Technology is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 207 publications have been published within this topic receiving 9407 citations.

Information systems innovation for environmental sustainability

Abstract: Human life is dependent upon the natural environment, which, most would agree, is rapidly degrading. Business enterprises are a dominant form of social organization and contribute to the worsening, and enhancement, of the natural environment. Scholars in the administrative sciences examine questions spanning organizations and the natural environment but have largely omitted the information systems perspective. We develop a research agenda on information systems innovation for environmental sustainability that demonstrates the critical role that IS can play in shaping beliefs about the environment, in enabling and transforming sustainable processes and practices in organizations, and in improving environmental and economic performance. The belief-action-outcome (BAO) framework and associated research agenda provide the basis for a new discourse on IS for environmental sustainability.

Harnessing Green IT: Principles and Practices

Abstract: In addition to moving itself in a greener direction and leveraging other environmental initiatives, IT could help create green awareness among IT professionals, businesses, and the general public by assisting in building communities, engaging groups in participatory decisions, and supporting education and green advocacy campaigns. Along these lines, tools such as environmental Web portals, blogs, wikis, and interactive simulations of the environmental impact of an activity could offer assistance. Green IT is an economic, as well as an environmental, imperative. Greening IT is and will continue to be a necessity, not an option. Green IT represents a dramatic change in priority in the IT industry. So far, the industry has been focusing on IT equipment processing power and associated equipment spending. It's not been concerned with other requirements such as power, cooling, and data center space. However, going forward, the IT industry will need to deal with all of the infrastructure requirements and the environmental impact of IT and its use. The challenges of green IT are immense; however, recent developments indicate that the IT industry has the will and conviction to tackle our environmental issues head-on. The IT sector and users must develop a positive attitude toward addressing environmental concerns and adopt forward-looking, green-friendly policies and practices.

Information systems and environmentally sustainable development: energy informatics and new directions for the is community

Abstract: While many corporations and Information Systems units recognize that environmental sustainability is an urgent problem to address, the IS academic community has been slow to acknowledge the problem and take action We propose ways for the IS community to engage in the development of environmentally sustainable business practices Specifically, as IS researchers, educators, journal editors, and association leaders, we need to demonstrate how the transformative power of IS can be leveraged to create an ecologically sustainable society In this Issues and Opinions piece, we advocate a research agenda to establish a new subfield of energy informatics, which applies information systems thinking and skills to increase energy efficiency We also articulate how IS scholars can incorporate environmental sustainability as an underlying foundation in their teaching, and how IS leaders can embrace environmental sustainability in their core principles and foster changes that reduce the environmental impact of our community

From green to sustainability: Information Technology and an integrated sustainability framework

Abstract: Sustainability has increasingly become important to business research and practice over the past decades as a result of rapid depletion of natural resources and concerns over wealth disparity and corporate social responsibility. Within this realm, the so-called triple bottom line seeks to evaluate business performance on its impacts on the environment and interested stakeholders besides profitability concerns. So far, Management Information Systems research on sustainability has been somewhat constrained in the realm of green IT, which focuses mostly on the reduction of energy consumption of corporate IT systems. Using the resource-based view as the theoretical foundation, the manuscript develops an integrated sustainability framework, illustrating the integration of human, supply chain, and IT resources to enable firms develop sustainability capabilities, which help firms deliver sustainable values to relevant stakeholders and gain sustained competitive advantage. Particularly, the role of automate, informate, transform, and infrastructure IT resources are examined in the development of sustainability capabilities. The work calls for a bold new role of IT in sustainability beyond energy consumption reduction. Implications for future research and management practice on IT and sustainability are also discussed.

Transdisciplinary perspectives on environmental sustainability: a resource base and framework for IT-enabled business transformation

Abstract: The quality and future of human existence are directly related to the condition of our natural environment, but we are damaging the environment. Scientific evidence has mounted a compelling case that human behavior is responsible for deterioration in the Earth's natural environment, with the rate of deterioration predicted to increase in the future. Acknowledging this evidence, the governments of 192 countries have formally agreed to take action to resolve problems with the climate system, one of the most highly stressed parts of the natural environment. While the intention is clear, the question of how best to proceed is not. The research reported here undertook a three-phase approach of selecting, analyzing, and synthesizing relevant literature to develop a holistic, transdisciplinary, integrative framework for IT-enabled business transformation. The focus on business transformation is because business is recognized as being a critical contributor in realizing the challenges of environmental sustainability due to its potential capacity for innovation and change-locally, nationally, and globally. This article also serves as a resource base for researchers to begin to undertake significant information systems and multidisciplinary work toward the goal of environmental sustainability. Through selection and analysis of illustrative examples of current work from 12 academic disciplines across 6 core categories, the framework addresses the key issues of uncertainty: (1) What is meant by environmental sustainability? (2) What are its major challenges? (3) What is being done about these challenges? (4) What needs to be done?