Digital education revolution is not sustainable

Instead of doing this, the Australian Government is spending $1.1 billion increasing Australia's greenhouse gas emissions, when the plan could easily incorporate energy reduction measures. This is disturbingly similar to the plot of this week's ABC TV comedy The Hollowmen: "A Waste of Energy".

The Australian Government Department of Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts (DEWHA) asked me to help with a project to increase the energy efficiency of personal computers and monitors in Australia.

Input from the ICT industry and other interested parties was invited. Companies including Apple, IBM and Intel responded with details of their international energy saving initiatives. From these I proposed a strategy for the Australian ICT industry, in conjunction with government, to improve the energy efficiency of PCs and Monitors in Australia.

The target I proposed for Australian ICT was a 50 per cent reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 2020. This would contribute a 1 per cent overall reduction in Australia's greenhouse gas emissions. A 50 per cent reduction sounds like a lot, but is based on what can be done today using existing technology.

The computer industry makes rapid advances, with chips doubling in processing power about every 18 months. In the past this has been used to make much faster, slightly cheaper computers each year. But is now being used to make slightly faster, much cheaper, energy efficient computers.

The advances in processing capacity have reached the point where they are more than is needed for the typical home or school computer. Manufacturers are now offering smaller, cheaper, more energy efficient computers. But computer companies understandably promote their higher priced performance models, rather than their low energy budget models. So incentives and education are needed to encourage the community to buy better, rather than bigger, computers.

The strategy proposed for Australia is adoption of programs used in other countries for energy efficiency. It is proposed the voluntary use of the US EPA Energy Star program by the Australian ICT industry and web based industry and consumer education programs on energy efficiency.

To give this some force, the Australian federal and state governments can adopt a policy to purchase Energy Star products and using the web based information in their tender evaluations. While the program would be voluntary, those companies which did not offer Energy Star rated products and did not provide details of them on the web would be effectively excluded from all government tenders and government funded projects.

A few weeks ago I visited Hawker Primary School in Canberra and looked at their award winning sustainability efforts and e-learning. The students and teachers want to have sustainable computer education facilities and know what to do, but are stopped from doing this by the policies of the ACT Education Department. The students at the school teach sustainability to other schools.

The Deputy PM should drop by for a lesson from the students on what the Federal Government can do for sustainable computers in schools.