The writer is professor in computational space physics at the University of Helsinki. She is chair of the board of Technology Academy Finland, which awards the Millennium Technology Prize I was shocked to learn recently that some scientists want to scale back their research in an effort to decrease carbon emissions. I discovered this when I was sitting on a panel discussing sustainable space activities and my colleagues’ concerns about their contribution to global warming was palpable. The crisis is here, they said, and we need to cut back on our energy intensive modelling. At the very least, we need to make our energy use far more sustainable.
It is unarguable that our laboratories, scientific instruments, rockets and satellites — the tools we scientists need to measure the planet’s pulse — demand significant amounts of energy both in their construction and operation. And it is equally true that science’s unrelenting appetite for information has caused a mushrooming of energy-intensive data centres around the world. According to the International Energy Agency, these buildings now consume about 1 per cent of the world’s electricity.
However, this is a price we must pay for understanding the world. How can we inform decision makers about the best ways to bring down carbon emissions if we can’t track the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, where it’s coming from and who’s producing it? The carbon emissions from technological research are well spent: ultimately this research will safeguard the future of our planet.