area of Walt Disney World in Orlando.197 However, data centre land use and energy consumption are interlinked, with the energy infrastructure required for digital infrastructure expanding the sector’s effective land footprint. Waste Heat from data centres, often captured in wastewater, can degrade local ecosystems if not adequately cooled prior to release. For example, industrial water returned to the Hudson River 11°C warmer than the withdrawal temperature led to the death of over 2 million fish a year.198 Beyond physical waste, a growing contributor to nature impact is data waste or “dark data” that is collected, stored and processed but rarely or never used. Such data can represent as much as 60-75% of an organization’s stored information,199 consuming resources for storage, replication, back-ups and networking, alongside the embodied impacts of the hardware it occupies. In data centres, unnecessary data retention drives demand for additional server capacity, higher storage rack densities and more cooling, increasing electricity and water requirements. Hardware and e-waste Hardware value chain impacts Hardware manufacturing also has material nature impacts and dependencies. For example, 75% of a smartphone’s carbon footprint (excluding end- of-life) comes from manufacturing,200 generating 55 kg of CO2.201 One phone can require 34 kg of ore to be mined. With over 1.4 billion smartphones produced annually, this equates to 47.6 billion kg of mined ore, with its associated upstream nature impacts. This annual production generates 77 billion kg of CO2, in addition to other nature impacts such as water use and pollution.202 Manufacturing and transporting one laptop can emit between 160 and 480 kg of CO2 and require over 600 kg of raw materials.203 Though not within the scope of this report, transportation and packaging of hardware products have significant additional nature impacts and dependencies. E-waste and pollution Land use is a substantial consideration given the volume of e-waste produced. The ~238 million cubic metres generated annually204,205 could cover the land area of Manhattan four metres deep. Given its concentration of metals, e-waste can be highly toxic. In 2020, e-waste made up 2% of solid waste but 70% of hazardous waste sent to landfills.206 When not properly recycled, e-waste can release lead, mercury, beryllium, thallium, cadmium, arsenic and brominated flame retardants (BFRs), among other chemicals. These chemicals can lead to various health issues if not properly managed, including cancer, miscarriages, neurological damage, lung and respiratory impact and learning complications.207,208 A review of scientific studies conducted on e-waste sites for arsenic, cadmium, chromium, lead and mercury found that all but arsenic exceeded safe soil levels recommended by health organizations.209,210,211 Cadmium and chromium had concentrations over 300 times the recommended limit, lead had concentrations almost 1,000 times the recommended limit and mercury was around 6 times the recommended limit. Recycling e-waste is important to reduce the amount of waste produced, but it still has waste by-products. Pyrometallurgical processing recovers 45-85 kg of metals from 100 kg of waste, depending on the method used and the material being extracted.212,213 The remainder remains waste, although most of the organic input material will be burned off during the process, which can lower the level of solid waste produced by 5-20%.214 For hydrometallurgical processing, the quantity of remaining solid waste similarly varies, but research has shown that processing 100 kg of printed circuit boards (PCBs) typically still results in ~16 kg of solid waste to landfill.215 E-waste and end-of-life greenhouse gas emissions From 2014 to 2020, annual e-waste GHG emissions rose 53% to 580 million metric tonnes of CO2e.216 This figure is projected to increase to 852 million metric tonnes of CO2e by 2030 in a business-as-usual scenario.217 HCFCs and HFCs found within temperature exchange equipment reflect one significant source.218 These refrigerants are potent GHGs, with GWP up to 12,000 times higher than CO2.219 In 2022, proper e-waste management prevented 41 million tonnes CO2e of these refrigerants from entering the atmosphere.220 HCFCs are being phased out since the Montreal Protocol. Developed countries stopped use by 2020 and developing countries are on track to phase them out by 2030.221 While initially slated to replace HCFCs given lower impact on the ozone layer, HFCs also have a very high GWP and are being phased out in line with the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol. Nature Positive: Role of the Technology Sector 62

Nature Positive Role of the Technology Sector 2025