Dear RIPE Community, I'd like to share most recent links about environmental/ecological (un)sustainability in the  operations of the Internet Infrastructures, this time in 3 categories: Energy Outlook, Network Cultures & Data Centers News. The latest "World Energy Outlook 2024" by  International Energy Agency (IEA) points out to "faster growth in data-centre loads". Report "comes against a backdrop of escalating risks in the Middle East and heightened geopolitical tensions globally, and explores a range of energy security issues that decision makers face as they proceed with clean energy transitions". Analysis:https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-solar-surge-will-send-coal-power-tumbli... Original:https://www.iea.org/reports/world-energy-outlook-2024 And then for something completely different: broad, philosophical read:

(a) media history of the material and infrastructural features of networking practices, a German classic translated for the first time into English.

"The Connectivity of Things: Network Cultures since 1832" (Open Access) By Sebastian Giessmann, Steven Lindberg at The MIT Press: Infrastructures https://direct.mit.edu/books/oa-monograph/5866/The-Connectivity-of-ThingsNet... and specifically interesting for us: Book Chapter 9: Network Protocols: Architectures of Computers and Communication Around 1970 DOI: https://doi.org/10.7551/mitpress/12547.003.0012 Finally, a collection of Data Center News from this month: The Register: "...datacenter operators might seek alternative sources of power... " https://www.theregister.com/2024/10/14/ai_datacenters_coal/ A comic "First Dog on the Moon": "... the huge new datacenters AI requires use so much energy and water, it's delaying the closure of coal-fired power plants and FORCING people to build nuclear reactors." https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/picture/2024/oct/30/artificial-int... The New York Times: "... Residents battled developers to keep a giant data center out of their community." https://archive.is/2024.10.30-075748/https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/29/tech... GovTech: Power-Hungry Data Centers Pose a Challenge to (USA) Government https://www.govtech.com/infrastructure/power-hungry-data-centers-pose-a-chal... ZME Science: "... Time to practice digital sobriety..." https://www.zmescience.com/science/news-science/ai-is-becoming-a-bigger-and-... Regards, Vesna Manojlovic Senior Community Builder RIPE NCC