Digital Transformation: Environmental Friend or Foe? Panel Discussion at the Australasian Conference on Information Systems 2019

TL;DR

This paper discusses the dual impact of digital transformation on environmental sustainability, highlighting both its potential benefits and negative consequences, and calls for further research to address this complex issue.

Contribution

It presents a panel discussion that explores the contradictory effects of digital transformation on the environment and suggests future research directions.

Findings

Digital transformation can improve efficiency and reduce environmental harm.

Ubiquitous technologies increase data center capacity, negatively impacting the environment.

The need for ongoing research on digital transformation's environmental effects.

Abstract

The advent of digital technologies such as social media, mobile, analytics, cloud computing and internet-of-things has provided unique opportunities for organizations to engage in innovations that are affordable, easy-to-use, easy-to-learn and easy-to-implement. Transformations through such technologies often have positive impacts on business processes, products and services. As such, organizations have managed to increase productivity and efficiency, reduce cycle time and make substantial gains through digital transformation. Such transformations have also been positively associated with reducing harmful environmental impacts by providing organizations alternative ways of undertaking their business activities. However, in recent times, especially with an abundance of technologies being available at near-zero costs, questions regarding the potential negative impacts of digital transformation on the environment have arisen. The morass of the ubiquitous technologies around us necessitates the continuing creation of large data centers, that are increasing their capacity yielding a negative impact on the environment. Considering this dialectical contradiction, a panel was conducted at the Australasian Conference on Information Systems (ACIS) in Perth, Australia, in 2019. Its aim was to invigorate the dialogue regarding the impact of digital transformation on environmental sustainability and suggested some directions for future research in this area.