The Transitions² program, led by the Fing with ADEME, Iddri, Inria, GreenIT.fr, the Conseil National du Numérique, Explor'ables and others, aims to:
- The ecological transition is the indispensable horizon of our societies, the digital transition the great transforming force of our time. The first knows its destination but struggles to find its path; the second is our daily life, a permanent force for change but one that does not pursue a particular collective objective. One has the goal, the other the path: each of the two transitions needs the other!
- To explore the new avenues opened up by the convergence of digital and ecological technologies - without concealing the risks
- To give meaning to the digital transition, by confronting it with ecological challenges;
- To decompartmentalize the communities of actors from the ecological and digital sectors respectively and to engage in concrete actions that bring them together.
1- Technology does not provide solutions, but solutions can produce technologies
It is convenient to consider the ecological question as a set of "challenges", problems or objectives, that one would only need to analyze one by one to propose "solutions": it is an engineers' dream, at the source of a multitude of well-intentioned initiatives that mobilize technologies (notably digital) to "respond to the great challenges of humanity". Digital technology is generally the measurement and calculation infrastructure for these actions.On the one hand, this is a singularly narrow way of looking at the digital. But above all, the ecological question is systemic, the "problems" are inextricably linked to each other and cannot be treated separately.If digital technology is to help respond to the ecological crisis (in the sense of metamorphosis), it must be by supporting other development models, other forms of production, exchange and consumption.- Challenge n°6 : Imaginaries as paths of transition
- Challenge #7: Build a roadmap for the sustainable and intelligent city
- Challenge n°8: An "Industry of the Future" that takes the environment seriously
2- The transformational power of digital technology is not in the calculation, but in the collective action
Citizen devices for measuring air quality (via low-cost sensors) will only change behavior if they mobilize groups of residents of a neighborhood or building, colleagues, and parents. Data are a major source of knowledge creation, but their use in organizations also produces decompartmentalization and contributes to "breaking down the silos". Sustainable mobility is first and foremost a matter of governance, of orchestrating a multitude of innovative initiatives and new forms of partnership and collaboration between private and public players.The main strength of digital technology in the service of the ecological transition is not to be found in calculation, but in sharing, collaboration and social ties. It is on the side of collective approaches that it will be most able to propose levers for transformation.On the other hand, a "common culture" of digital and environmental issues is more necessary than ever. Digital technology is a source of renewed imagination, it knows how to organize collaboration and sometimes scale up; ecology knows how to give a goal to innovation, take into account "rebound effects", and think in systems. This cultural dimension - learning from each other and producing new syntheses - is an essential prerequisite for any approach that would like to benefit from both.- Challenge 3: Digital technology for a collective approach to sustainable mobility
- Challenge n°4 : Putting data at the service of environmental impacts
- Challenge #5: Distributed air quality measurement
- Challenge 9: Digital technology for local environmental policies
- Challenge #10: Shared space strategies
3- Digital collaboration and democratic ecology are linked, but they don't know it yet
Digital models (open, agile, distributed, collaborative, etc.) have demonstrated transformative potential in all sorts of areas, but their contribution to ecological issues is not obvious. They remain models: if we do not give them a real ecological intention, a goal, the results will not follow. The disappointed promises of the collaborative economy are there to remind us.Similarly, all the civic tech in the world will not be enough to bring about an "ecological democracy" if citizens and political institutions (formal or informal) are not inspired by this issue.A strategic rapprochement between the actors of ecology, those of public and democratic innovation (digital or not), and those of digital collaboration, would open new perspectives for the emergence of a non-technical ecology, both everyday and political.- Challenge #11: "Open models" for the ecological transition
- Challenge #13: Linking digital and low tech
- Challenge #14: Mobilize digital technology for an "ecological democracy
- Challenge n°15 : A second life for the "Commons" of ecology
- Challenge #17: The contribution of digital technology to agriculture, agroecology and permaculture
- Challenge #19: Towards the Internet of Energy
4- Innovation will only play a positive role in the ecological transition if it focuses on its impact as much as on its economic model
To achieve the ecological transition, we need innovation, but not just any innovation: projects that aim for ambitious, explicit and credible environmental impacts, that take an interest in their impacts on other sectors and actors - and, above all, that give themselves the means to verify that they will be achieved, which is still too little the case today.On the other hand, innovation will only play a positive ecological role if the innovation system - the set of methods, institutions and financial mechanisms that make possible, legitimize and select innovative proposals - evolves to give as much importance to the impact of projects (ecological and social, positive and negative) as to the creation of economic value.Better linking the business model of an innovation to its impact model, accompanying and supporting innovators who will take the trouble to do so: it is on this double condition that innovation will really be able to deliver on its promises.- Challenge n°2 : Directing innovation towards the search for major impacts
5- Digital and its industry must lead the way
"IT for Green is not an excuse to abandon Green IT". Or put differently: the digital sector must reconsider its own ecological footprint (which is massive) before claiming to equip approaches, models, collectives... The digital industry and its users should be the bridgeheads of the circular economy, by offering eco-responsible, modular, repairable, recyclable and, above all, longer-lasting products; and services clearly thought in a spirit of frugality (in terms of computing and network resources, but also in terms of time and attention).A digital agenda at the service of an environmental issue will thus have to pay attention to a digital "ecological by design". Digital technology will also have to review its design methods more broadly: enlightening rather than opacifying decision-making, seeking to fluidify attention rather than instrumentalizing it, distributing the power to act rather than prescribing, etc. Digital technology needs a "RESET": reconsidering its contribution to the ecological transition is the perfect opportunity to initiate its transformation!- Challenge 1: "Green by design" digital technology
- Challenge n°16: A common culture of digital and ecological issues in the service of the SDGs
- Challenge #20: Against Collapse
Référence :
