The Ministry of Defence has published its Sustainable Digital Technology and Services strategic approach, highlighting six goals aimed at addressing historical deficiencies within its approach to sustainability.
The goals include providing Net Zero digital services, developing an embedded circular economy in digital technology and offering digital services that improve sustainability.
The development of a circular economy in digital technology aims to tackle the "ever-increasing e-waste problem", with new equipment dependent on finite resources such as rare earth elements.
As part of its approach, the MOD set out the following four objectives:
• All digital technology and services are designed to meet stringent sustainability standards.
• Procurement of remanufactured and upgraded hardware is increased.
• Device re-use is increased.
• Landfill from digital technology is reduced to zero.
The goal is not alien to many players within the digital space and was highlighted by Techbuyer in its recent contribution to The Parliamentary Review.
A specialist in buying, refurbishment and selling of servers, storage and networking equipment for businesses, Techbuyer is keenly aware of the environmental benefits of reusing IT equipment
In his article for the Review, Techbuyer managing director Kevin Towers argued that without shifting to a circular approach, the world could "run out of IT-specific raw materials copper, lithium and silver within 50-100 years".
"One of the major benefits of our research was the discovery of the circular economy and how it applies to the refurbishment sector," he said.
"Reports predict the world will run out of IT-specific raw materials copper, lithium and silver within 50-100 years if we carry on our current path. The alternative is to create new models for development such as designing products for reuse, recovery and recycling, developing sharing platforms, extending product life and remanufacture.
"Our business is an example of a circular economy product life extension model. Companies like Techbuyer prove how successful this can be as a job creator, delivering value to the market as a whole," Towers concluded.
