Source: www.blogdumoderateur.com

Digital technology accounts for 4.4 % of the national carbon footprint, according to the latest figures published by ADEME and Arcep. What are the main sources of environmental impact in the day-to-day activities of digital professionals?

The major environmental impact of digital technology does not stem from its use, but from the production of our computers, smartphones, and televisions. The trend toward giant screens and the frequent replacement of devices significantly worsen this environmental footprint.

Data consumption by data centers—the “factories of the web”—is skyrocketing, driven by artificial intelligence, which is extremely power-hungry.

The «digital bloat» of services is an impact that goes unnoticed. Many websites and apps are developed with unnecessary features, data that is never deleted, and unoptimized code and/or media.

All this excess clutters up the services and forces servers and devices to consume more energy for no reason.

Of the «digital wastes» you observe in your company, which ones do you think should be addressed first?

We must stop creating things that are useless or superfluous.

The priority is to stop developing services and features that no one uses. This is the most costly waste, because a useless feature consumes resources at every stage: design, development, and, above all, 24/7 hosting.

The solution is to systematically track usage and focus only on what is essential.

Among other priorities, I recommend:

• to shut down «ghost/zombie services»: These are all the old websites, servers for completed projects, or forgotten test environments that are running for no reason. A server that’s turned on—even if it’s inactive—consumes energy continuously. The solution is simple and has an immediate effect: regularly audit your IT infrastructure and decommission (turn off) anything that’s no longer relevant.
• to stop the accumulation of unnecessary data: The tendency to store everything «just in case» (emails, documents, archives, etc.) is a major waste. This data fills up data centers, causing their energy consumption to skyrocket.

We need to establish clear rules for archiving what is important and, above all, systematically deleting what is no longer important.

What obstacles do companies face when they want to take action? Are these obstacles technical, cultural, or organizational in nature?

Digital technology is still perceived as «intangible» and therefore clean. The dominant culture is one of «always more» (more features, more data), which makes the concept of «simplicity» difficult to accept, as it is often mistakenly perceived as a step backward. Companies often rely on «technosolutionism» or IT to transform their operations and improve performance.

They generally operate in silos (developers, marketing, infrastructure), without a common goal in this area. Performance is measured by speed and budget, not by environmental impact. And most importantly, there is no culture, no habit, and no process for «shutting down» old, unnecessary services, which continue to consume energy for no reason.

How can a company actually measure its digital footprint? What tools or resources would you recommend using to do this?

There are several tools and approaches available if you want to measure your organization's environmental footprint. First, there's the WeNR, and the WeNR light, which is an ideal solution for an initial, free self-assessment. It allows you to evaluate the company’s overall strategy (governance, procurement, service lifecycle) and identify priority areas for improvement.

Next, there are many other tools available for assessing an organization's IT infrastructure. I would mention, in particular, EcoDiag from Ecoinfo. Based on an inventory of your computers and smartphones, it calculates their carbon footprint over their entire life cycle.

NumEcoEval (via GitLab) is also a solution that allows you to calculate the environmental footprint of an information system.

If you want to measure the environmental impact of your digital services, there are also the Ecoindex and its variations for CI/CD pipelines. Tools such as SiteSpeed.io is very useful for thoroughly reviewing all of your web services and understanding the environmental footprint of the content you present to your customers and website visitors. To take it a step further, you can also use Scaphandre, PowerAPI, and others.

In your opinion, which awareness-raising approaches are the most effective in bringing about lasting changes in employee behavior?

When it comes to raising awareness, there is the Digital Mural. This is a collaborative and engaging workshop designed to create a collective «wake-up call.» It helps participants collectively understand the challenges and scale of the digital revolution’s impact, thereby establishing a common ground for discussion.

To take action, you have the Digital Cleanup Day. This is a collective action event designed to immediately put theory into practice. By eliminating data and measuring the gains, employees make the impact tangible and see the direct results of their efforts.

And for professional development, there's the INR MOOC (new 2026 version), which is an online course open to everyone and offers the opportunity to earn a certification.

This transforms awareness into a valuable professional skill, which strongly motivates employees.

The next Digital Cleanup Day will be held on March 21, 2026. How can digital professionals get involved?

The easiest way for digital professionals is to go to the official website for Digital Cleanup Day. The activities organized as part of this initiative can take place between March 16 and 21, 2026, allowing them to be spread out over the entire week.

There, you can find comprehensive organizational kits to help you run your event, mobilize teams, and measure its impact. Please note that you must create an account to access these documents.

In practical terms, the cleanup effort focuses on two levels:

• cleaning for personal use, including initiatives aimed at employees, which involve cleaning out email inboxes and devices (computers, smartphones) to delete unnecessary data.
• cleaning of technical infrastructure, which includes databases—by archiving or deleting obsolete data; shared document repositories; development environments and servers (whether virtualized or not); code repositories such as GitHub, etc.

This is a new initiative being highlighted for the 2026 edition: the goal is to tackle hidden waste by carrying out operations to «clean up» technical environments. This is where the expertise of digital professionals is key.

Beyond cleaning, companies can collect end-of-life digital equipment, but they can also: donate functional digital equipment to give it a second life; raise awareness among their suppliers, customers, and partners; or review the responsible digital charter proposed by the INR. They can also join our think tank to integrate these practices into their daily operations.

Guillaume Gallon is a project manager at the Institute for Responsible Digital Technology. He raises awareness and supports organizations in improving their digital performance by helping them better manage their environmental impacts, while combining technological innovation with responsibility. He has helped develop key industry standards, such as the AFNOR standard, the WeNR tools, and the GR491 framework…