The scale of emissions from wireless systems

Across all areas of human activity there is increasing realisation that the emission of greenhouse gases is causing undesirable global warming effects and coupled with this is a desire, and in some cases a requirement, to reduce emissions. This applies to the wireless sector as much as to any other.

It is not entirely clear exactly what contribution wireless makes to greenhouse-gas emissions. Doing such calculations is always very difficult, in particular in defining what should be within their scope. For example, it is clear that power consumed by base stations and mobile-handset chargers should be included, but what about power consumed by laptops that have embedded wireless devices? Deciding whether to include manufacturing and recycling costs can be problematic, as can attribution of costs in areas such as the paper used by cellular operators in the normal course of their business. All of this means that any attribution will be approximate and may change over time, both as more information becomes available and as decisions on the elements to include change.

There is basic agreement on the broad contribution of information and communication technology (ICT), with the total global carbon footprint in 2008 estimated to be about 800 MtCO2e (mega-tons of carbon dioxide or equivalent) or approximately 2% of global emissions. This is predicted to grow to about 1,400 MtCO2e by 2020, or approximately 2.8% of global emissions at that date.