As the UK enters the more complex phase of its net zero transition, the digital sector is facing up to being both essential to decarbonisation and an increasingly significant source of emissions, resource use and waste.
At the recent GDSA Summit, public and private sector leaders explored how digital government can move beyond incremental efficiency gains while tackling Scope 3 emissions, digital waste and the environmental implications of AI adoption.
Chaired by Gavin Johnson, programme leader at the Home Office, the session brought together perspectives from policy, industry and sustainability specialists (pictured) to examine what the next phase of net zero delivery means for digital services and ICT estates.
From progress to the “harder phase” of net zero
Libby Forrest-Lim from The Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) explained that the UK has already reduced greenhouse gas emissions by 63 percent since 1990, even as GDP and population have grown – a significant achievement largely driven by decarbonisation in the power sector.
However, she warned that the next stage will be considerably more challenging.
“A lot of the easier stuff has already been done… going forward, we’re going to need to see accelerated change from every sector,” she said.
For digital government, this means moving beyond operational emissions and addressing harder-to-measure impacts across supply chains, infrastructure and service design. Targets remain “stretching and challenging,” but the potential rewards include reduced operational costs, access to green finance and new market opportunities alongside environmental benefits.
Digital: enabler of net zero – and a source of impact
A tension discussed throughout the panel was digital’s dual role in the transition. Ewen Anderson, founder and CEO of consultancy P2zero and the co-chair of the GDSA Scope 3 Working Group, noted: “Digital is going to be a part of that change. We will not make that change without it.”
Yet the sector’s growth in energy demand, infrastructure and resource use creates its own environmental pressures. While decarbonising energy supply reduces some impacts, most emissions increasingly sit in Scope 3, embedded in supply chains, manufacturing and service ecosystems.
Anderson argued that current decision-making frameworks remain too narrow.
“We need to stop thinking about our decisions… on a purely financial cost risk basis, and start to include externalities, so social value, planetary waste, pollution,” he said.
The overlooked challenge: digital waste and unnecessary services
One theme was the scale of “invisible” digital waste created by duplication, over-engineering and legacy processes. Hitachi Solutions’ government industry director, Emma Charles, described research across civil servants showing that many digital systems persist simply due to institutional inertia.
“Processes which are there for historical reasons… probably don’t actually need to be there at all,” she said.
She warned of a growing risk that digitisation and automation can unintentionally accelerate waste rather than reduce it, particularly when inefficient processes are simply moved online.
“There’s a real danger of digitising things… that shouldn’t exist in the first place.”
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Examples included duplicate systems being rebuilt across departments, excessive user research processes, and even the carbon footprint of large-scale procurement exercises involving dozens of supplier bids. For digital government, the implication is clear: the most sustainable service is often the one that is not built.
AI, infrastructure and the net zero trade-offs
With AI rapidly being embedded into public services, the panel examined how to balance innovation with environmental cost. Director of sustainable business at Transform UK, Claire Robinson, explained that AI is frequently misunderstood and treated as a blanket solution, despite wide variation in environmental impact across model types.
While some applications can deliver clear environmental benefits, such as biodiversity mapping or supply chain optimisation, others rely on highly energy-intensive computation.
“You get… models where they’re kind of brute force… that’s when you start to get really negative environmental consequences,” she said.
Robinson stressed that net zero decision-making must move beyond carbon alone to include water use, materials and e-waste, advocating for a “net positivity” approach that weighs environmental, social and economic outcomes together.
Productivity, behaviour and the psychology of digital consumption
The panel also explored why efficiency gains do not always translate into emissions reductions. Anderson pointed to behavioural dynamics such as increased consumption when digital resources become easier to access.
“The more we make something into a commodity that’s easy to consume, the less we value it, and the more we consume it,” he said.
Cloud provisioning, for example, enables rapid scaling of infrastructure in ways that would previously have been constrained by physical datacentre limits. Without governance and accountability, this convenience can drive overuse and duplication rather than efficiency.
A more sustainable approach, he argued, involves aligning digital provision more closely with actual organisational needs, including profiling users, extending device lifecycles and avoiding unnecessary refresh cycles that generate avoidable embodied emissions.
Scope 3 and supply chain accountability
A major takeaway for digital government leaders was the central importance of Scope 3 emissions.
“The biggest thing you have to tackle to reach net zero is scope three,” said Anderson, urging organisations to engage actively with suppliers and demand transparent reporting.
Public sector procurement standards were recognised as a positive step, embedding sustainability requirements into supply chains. However, panellists agreed that reporting alone is insufficient unless supported by transparent metrics and meaningful collaboration with suppliers.
Another barrier identified was the invisibility of digital carbon impacts. Unlike financial costs, environmental costs are rarely surfaced in day-to-day decisions about services, infrastructure or meetings.
Ultimately, the panel argued that continuing the journey to net zero requires a shift in mindset from optimising existing systems to questioning their necessity and long-term impact. To that point, Robinson advocated for continuous evaluation of digital initiatives through a net-positive lens, asking: “Do the benefits here outweigh the costs… for real people?”
