This section refers to all digital and ICT products and services such as computers and peripheral equipments (laptop, desktop, screens and accessories… ), communication equipments (phones, accessories…), consumer electronic equipments and services such as IT technical consulting and support services, IT design and development services, hosting and IT infrastructure provisioning services…

If you do not have yet a sustainable procurement policy, please refer to the global sustainable procurement policy in resources to write one.

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- Analyze consumption and existing practices:‍

• Identify most purchased ICT products and services
• Ask your ICT suppliers what are your highest carbon footprint products/services
• Deploy solutions to know what you already have in your company: softwares, hardwares... You can either go for custom solutions (xls documents are already a good start!), but Software Asset Management is best to keep track of your licenses for instance. This has proven to be useful to: make the best of what your company already has, make sure you can extend warranties before migrating to new softwares, save money and energy since you have all your inventory in mind. This can also be deployed for hardware through Telecom Asset Management and any other hardware.

- Define targets and KPI evolution, such as:

• Sustainable or eco-certified ICT products/services amount percentage on total ICT products/services buying amount. It can be declined per category (computers, technical consulting…)
• Carbon footprint evolution for main ICT products volumes. It should decrease deploying all below recommendations.

- Develop a circular procurement when you are purchasing ICT products and include criteria with a circular approach in your specifications. ‍

• Choose certified products, green design products that reduce the use of hazardous materials:
  - Promote the purchase of products that meet internationally recognized “green” labeling standards such as EPEAT, Energy Star or Blue Angel
  - TCO Certified is the leading sustainability certification for IT products, driving social and environmental sustainability throughout the IT product life cycle
• Buy durable, can be upgraded and repaired products. In most cases it is also better from a financial perspective, even when service and upgrading costs are included. At least one year product life extension has a substantial impact.
• Provide employees with laptops instead of desktops, it consumes less electricity.
• Reduce the number of smartphones: Adopt the "Bring Your Own Device" policy and replace pro and personal phones by a single one with reimbursment of bills, double SIM card, double number to protect personal privacy if need be...
• Buy extensive warranties to encourage both durable product design and longer usage time. In the absence of warranties, nobody will repair products when necessary. If you are a large scale company, you can try to negotiate your license extension for a specific software. Ask for a long term repair and maintenance warranty, not a "replace by new" warranty.
• Extend shelf life of your materials via leasing (you should include end-of-life handling in your contract) and evolutive material (RAM, batteries...)
• Buy Products and materials which are made for recycling (e.g. removal batteries) and require your products to be disassembled and handed into safe recycling
• Purchase products that have already been used whenever possible. Focus on the possibilities offered by professional refurbishing and remanufacturing businesses.
• Investigate and opt for "as a service" products. Under the "as a service", you pay for the use of digital products and not for the equipment itself whose ownership remains with the manufacturer. As a result, your supplier will make its utmost to keep the equipment running as long as possible, to avoid non-reparable features, programmed obsolescence and therefore decreasing its carbon footprint.
  

Note: Don’t overestimate the environmental and financial effects of changing to a more energy efficient device. In most cases, the potential savings can be offset by negative impacts in the manufacturing phase. (rebound effect)

To go further: Promote / demand the use of Recommendation ITU (International Telecommunication Union) -T L.1420, “Methodology for energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions impact assessment of information and communication technologies in organizations”, to quantify and report energy consumption and GHG emissions of your suppliers.

The best way to decrease your electronics footprint is to keep your equipment as long as possible. The same applies for your desktops and laptops. Extend the life of your computer from 2 to 4 years will decrease by 50% its environmental footprint (Ademe Report).

To find some tips on how to embark your management into a sustainable IT governance, make sure to read our article.