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    Environment Variables

    Each episode we discuss the latest news regarding how to reduce the emissions of software and how the industry is dealing with its own environmental impact. Brought to you by The Green Software Foundation.
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    Episodes (64)

    AI Legislation

    AI Legislation
    This week, Chris Adams is joined by Asim Hussain and Anne Currie for an engaging chat on the present and future of legislation around AI and Green Software. Our guests share their hot takes on various topics such as the usefulness of proxies in measurement. With backgrounds in climate and tech, and a future full of green energy, they share their insights into what we might expect, and hope for, from the future.

    Greening Serverless

    Greening Serverless
    Chris Adams is joined by special guest Kate Goldenring, Senior Software Engineer at Fermyon. Together, they ask the real questions “is serverless computing the greener choice?” and “if so, under what circumstances is this true?” Tune in for an illuminating conversation on the current state, news, and future of green computing, digging into the topics of cloud computing, soft allocation, WebAssembly, and more.

    Carbon Hack 2024 Announcement

    Carbon Hack 2024 Announcement
    We're gearing up for the return of Carbon Hack 24 happening from March 18 to April 8, 2024. This year we're focusing on the Impact Framework, aiming to innovate how we measure the environmental impact of software. It's a chance for engineers, designers, and creators to dive into challenges, ranging from plugin development to non-technical content creation. We're inviting students too, with special categories just for them. Join us to push the boundaries of sustainable software. For details on how to register or to become a sponsor, check out the link below: Register at https://grnsft.org/hack/podcast 👈

    The Week in Green Software: Embodied Carbon

    The Week in Green Software: Embodied Carbon
    This Week in Green Software, host Chris Adams is joined by Gabi Beyer and Brendan Kamp from re:cinq to talk about the recent initiatives to and consequences of the prolonging of the lifecycle of technology. The challenges of measuring carbon emissions in personal laptops and cloud services are discussed, highlighting the complexities of quantifying environmental impact, as well as companies reporting on these metrics. Tune in for a lively discussion on sustainable software development.

    The Week in Green Software: CNCF TAG Environmental Sustainability

    The Week in Green Software: CNCF TAG Environmental Sustainability
    Join TWiGS host Chris Adams in talking to Kristina Devochko, tech lead of the Environmental Sustainability TAG at the Cloud Native Computing Foundation. Kristina shares her journey from economics to tech sustainability, and eventually joining this Technical Advisory Group. Further, they discuss the mission and projects of the group, as well as how anyone interested and willing is able to contribute. She elaborates on her experience of diving into this new field with no prior knowledge and acts as a reminder that no matter how scary it seems, you can do it too.

    BETA Impact Framework

    BETA Impact Framework
    Asim Hussain is joined by guests Srini Rakhunathan and Navveen Balani, the technical leads on the Impact Framework. They delve into how this innovative tool effectively models, measures, simulates, and monitors the environmental impacts of software across various platforms. The conversation explores the framework's unique ability to handle diverse environments, from cloud systems to mobile devices, with an emphasis on the practicality and necessity of measuring software emissions accurately. Highlights include intriguing insights into integrating the Impact Framework with SCI Open Data and the future of green software development. This episode is packed with valuable information and thought-provoking discussions that offer a glimpse into the future of sustainable software.

    Cloud Footprints with CCF

    Cloud Footprints with CCF
    Host Chris Adams is joined by Arik Smith and Cameron Cash from Thoughtworks in this episode of Environment Variables. Together they discuss the Cloud Carbon Footprint (CCF) tool and the role it plays in sustainable software development. Join this conversation as they nerd out together about the future of measuring carbon in the cloud, open source collaboration, and some cool posters in the background.

    Driving Climate Change Solutions with AI

    Driving Climate Change Solutions with AI
    In this episode we take a look back at another talk from our Decarb 2023 Event while we’re all on the New Year break at the GSF. Titled Driving Climate Change Solutions with AI, Charlotte Degot of CO2 AI and Diana Dimitrova from Boston Consulting Group talk about the Third Annual Carbon Emissions Survey titled Why Some Companies are Ahead in the Race to Net Zero.

    The Week in Green Software: Google, Grids & Green Software

    The Week in Green Software: Google, Grids & Green Software
    TWiGS host Chris Adams is joined by guest Savannah Goodman from Google, to bring you the latest news and updates from the world of sustainable software development. They discuss insights from Google’s Sustainability report, the need for a fossil fuel free internet by 2030 and the importance of microgrids and nanogrids. They also highlight Google's sustainability tools including Cloud Region Picker, Active Assist and Carbon Footprint.

    Responsible AI

    Responsible AI
    From the recent Decarbonize Software 2023 event, this episode showcases a fireside chat on Responsible AI with Tammy McClellan from Microsoft and Jesse McCrosky from ThoughtWorks. Jesse shares his thoughts and experiences from years of working in the field of Sustainable Tech on the topics of risks, sustainability, and more regarding AI, before answering some questions from the audience.

    Decarbonize Software 2023: Recap

    Decarbonize Software 2023: Recap
    Chris Skipper hosts this episode of Environment Variables with guests Sophie Trinder and Adam Jackson to discuss the unveilings, questions, and highlights from the recent Decarbonize Software 2023 event. The GSF has announced its Impact Framework during the event that had taken place in November, and together with Chris, our guests discuss the realities of (and dreams for) the state of green software in this recap of Decarb 2023.

    The Week in Green Software: Greening the Front End

    The Week in Green Software: Greening the Front End
    Chris Adams is joined by Ines Akrap from Cognizant to talk all-things sustainable web design. Together, they delve into the nuances of designing energy-efficient websites and the challenges of green coding in frontend development. Ines shares valuable insights from her experiences at the Linux Energy Foundation Summit and the SDIA Green Coding Summit. The episode also explores common mistakes in optimizing sites for carbon efficiency and discusses exciting projects in the field of green software that are generating buzz. Resources like Website Carbon, Ecograder, and Lighthouse are highlighted, alongside discussions on the Software Carbon Intensity Specification and the CarbonAware SDK. This episode is a must-listen for anyone interested in the intersection of web development and sustainability, offering practical tips and exploring new research horizons in the quest to decarbonize the digital world.

    Introducing the Impact Framework

    Introducing the Impact Framework
    In this episode of Environment Variables, we dive into a key highlight from Decarbonize Software 2023, featuring Asim Hussain's talk on the Green Software Foundation's newly introduced Impact Framework. This innovative framework aims to model, measure, simulate, and monitor the environmental impacts of software. Asim begins with an insightful overview of the framework's capabilities and objectives. Later, project leads Srinivasan Rakhunathan and Navveen Balani join the discussion to delve deeper into its applications and potential. This episode offers an essential understanding of how the Impact Framework is set to revolutionize the way we assess and mitigate the ecological footprint of software development and use.

    The Week in Green Software: Modeling Carbon Aware Software

    The Week in Green Software: Modeling Carbon Aware Software
    This Week, host Chris Adams is joined by TU Berlin researcher Iegor Riepin to talk about the benefits - and trade-offs - associated with load shifting over both space and time. Together, they nerd out over the specifics, discuss numbers, and weigh alternative methods of computing with green energy all around the globe. Iegor and his team did a study alongside Google, where they modeled the entire European electricity grid in order to study the effects of different types of load shifting, and how it can be most efficiently applied to the world of Green Software.

    The Week in Green Software: Greening Web Standards at the W3C

    The Week in Green Software: Greening Web Standards at the W3C
    TWiGS host Chris Adams is joined by special guests, Anne Faubry and Alexander Dawson of the W3C Community Group. This week, they discuss the Web Sustainability Guidelines as well as the Content Accessibility Guidelines. Web standards as specified by the World Wide Web consortium, play a huge role in shaping expectations about how the web is supposed to work, and for whom. This week’s guests talk about their respective roles in the W3C and in publishing the guidelines, as well as how they came to be part of the group. Listen in to learn more about the differences between standards and guidelines, and what the Web Sustainability Guidelines aim to achieve.

    The Week in Green Software: Mapping Green Software on the Grid

    The Week in Green Software: Mapping Green Software on the Grid
    TWiGS host Chris Adams is joined by special guest Tony van Swet from Electricity Maps, to talk about the mapping of the carbon intensity of electricity grid. Tony shares some of the work that Electricity Maps has been doing to make it easier to understand how clean or dirty electricity is around the world, as well as how they’re making this data more accessible and usable to consumers. Join in on this candid conversation discussing the uses of such data and how to access it, as well as Tony talking about carbon intensity, open data, and open source.

    The Week in Green Software: New Research Horizons

    The Week in Green Software: New Research Horizons
    This Week in Green Software has Dr. Daniel Schien from the University of Bristol, UK, joining host Chris Adams to talk about old research, recent news, and future prospects all revolving around digital sustainability. This conversation touches on some of the work Daniel has done in the past (and plans to do in the future) as well as their thoughts and reckons on this and how it can be used to steer our efforts towards a sustainable future. Together, they cover topics such as streaming being the new flying, and some ways in which new research has changed their perspectives on some problems in green tech.

    The Week in Green Software: Net Zero Cloud

    The Week in Green Software: Net Zero Cloud
    This week, join host Chris Adams in a conversation with Tereze Gaile, global Sustainability SME at MuleSoft, a Salesforce company. Together they cover topics in sustainability from her organic sustainability role at MuleSoft, to various tools that are available to aid in the decarbonization of software. They touch on resources to help you learn important concepts and skills, how to bring sustainability into an organization, and much more on this episode of TWiGS.

    The Week in Green Software: Automating the Software Carbon Index

    The Week in Green Software: Automating the Software Carbon Index
    This Week in Green Software brings a conversation with Arne Tarara, CEO of Green Coding Berlin. Join host Chris Adams as they discuss the new programming language Mojo and its efficiency, as well as other news from the world of sustainable software development. Together they share their thoughts on progress in Grid Forecasting in order to reduce high-carbon electricity use, in particular a new announcement made by Apple in this field. Finally, Arne and Chris share what’s on their wishlist for green software in this latest episode of TWiGS.

    Decarbonize Software 2023 Preview with Namrata Narayan

    Decarbonize Software 2023 Preview with Namrata Narayan
    Join Chris Skipper and this week’s guest Namrata Narayan in discussing the upcoming Decarbonize Software 2023 event taking place this November, as well as the role Namrata plays in the GSF. In this episode, they cover the relationships between different member organizations and their role in green software and how they can work toward the same goals in a competitive environment. They touch on how and where this year’s Decarb event will take place and even how it has been set up to reduce its own carbon footprint. Hear about the planned sessions of the day and how to register in this episode of Environment Variables.