CO2GLE is a real-time, net-based installation that displays the amount of CO2 emitted on each second thanks to the global visits to Google.com.
What is the material impact of communications through the Internet? I often ask this question to my friends and colleagues, and I rarely get a reply. Indeed, almost nobody recalls that the Internet is made up of interconnected physical infrastructures which consume natural resources. How can such an evident fact become so blurred in the social imagination? This project was created from an urge to highlight the invisible connection between actions and consequences when using digital communications technologies.
40% of the Internet’s total carbon footprint may be attributed to the design of a web site. According to recent studies, Internet is responsible for the 2% of CO2 of global emissions, more than that of the aviation industry [1]. On average, the production of 1 kWh emits 544 gr. of CO2 [2]. It takes 13 kWh to transmit 1GB of information [3], the equivalent of 7,07 kg. of CO2. Following a study executed by CISCO, the estimated number of the annual global Internet data traffic in 2015 will go as far as 966 Exabytes (1.037.234.601.984GB) [4] and is expected to reach 1579,2 Exabytes by the end of 2018 [5].
Google.com is the most visited site on the Internet [6] and weighs nearly 2MB. The site processes an approximate average of 47000 requests every second [7], which represents an estimated amount of 500 kg of CO2 emissions per second.
Due to the complex set of actors involved in the configuration and operation of the Internet, it is impossible to determine the exact number of its CO2 emissions, so the data I present here is approximate. Therefore, CO2GLE acts as a symbolic agent which seeks to reveal the link between our actions and their material impact on the physical world, and aims at creating a mechanism that may trigger thoughts and actions that stimulate and re-appropriate subjectivity. I believe that this is an essential process in the generation of critical thought about the true nature of technology, and in the imagination of alternative techno-paradigms which may coherently respond to our environmental and human conditions.
[On average, this projects emits 0,037gr of CO2 per visit]