ABSTRACT

Development of the green economy will need technologies that are more efficient in the use of energy and other resources, and that minimise the generation of harmful pollutants (UNDESA, 2011). Such green technology is often considered to be ‘environmentally friendly’, by minimising the negative environmental impacts that can arise through production processes and the supply chain. The creation of technology that is applied either to conventional processes to make them more environmentally friendly, or to substitute for existing processes, is being widely pursued. For example, IBM recently developed ‘Project Big Green’ in which they committed to spend US$1 billion annually to research ways to make computing more environmentally friendly. This was predicted to yield average savings of 42 per cent for information technology enterprises (Hasper, 2009).