As a contributing stakeholder, Loughborough Business School represented by academics Professor Tom Jackson, Professor Ian Hodgkinson and Dr Vitor Castro helped to inform the report. Along with other stakeholders, they contributed insights on current practices, the modelling approach, and input assumptions.
The report breaks down the electricity consumption of the UK’s digital economy into three components, data centre operations, internet transmission, and end-user devices. It aims to help policymakers understand the full energy and carbon impacts of digitalisation.
The work uses hypothetical analyses to compare energy consumption across the value chain under low, medium, and high-energy futures, illustrated through three detailed use cases.
Loughborough University was one of several stakeholder organisations represented, alongside Imperial College London, Kings College London, Microsoft, University of Sussex and Uptime Institute.
Professor Tom Jackson said: “Digitalisation has become the hidden engine of modern life, but every click, stream, and computation has an energy cost.
“If we’re serious about net zero, we must decarbonise data itself. That means going beyond efficiency in data centres to rethinking how data are created, used, and stored. We need to build systems that are clean by design, powered by renewables, and aligned with circular-economy principles.”
Professor Ian Hodgkinson commented: “This report marks a key development in the conversation about data centres and the environment, showing that this is only part of the story.
“The forecasted increase in data creation and use is driving the need for more infrastructure. How organisations and societies manage the digital carbon footprint and their responsible use and deployment of digital technologies is an important next step.”
Dr Vitor Castro added: “Digital infrastructure is both an economic driver and an energy challenge. This report provides crucial evidence to guide balanced investment, ensuring that as digital capacity grows, it does so efficiently, equitably, and in line with the UK’s broader sustainability and productivity goals.”
The study represents a milestone in the UK’s evidence base for the sustainable digital transition and highlights Loughborough Business School’s thought leadership in Digital Decarbonisation, a field recognised globally by the World Economic Forum and now informing national and international policy frameworks.