Smarter, greener extractivism: digital infrastructures and the harnessing of new resources

References

• After Oil collective. (2022). Solarities: Seeking energy justice. University of Minnesota Press.
   Google Scholar
• Allan, J., Lakhal, H., & Lemaadel, M. (2021). An unjust transition: Energy, colonialism and extractivism in occupied Western Sahara. Transnational Institute, 10 November. https://longreads.tni.org/an-unjust-transition
   Google Scholar
• Allen, L. (2022). IDA boss says data centre moratorium weakens Ireland as a European tech hub. Business Post, 9 July. https://www.businesspost.ie/news/ida-boss-says-data-centre-moratorium-weakens-ireland-as-a-european-tech-hub/
   Google Scholar
• Amazon Press Center. (2023). Amazon sets a new record for most renewable energy purchased by a single company. Amazon Press Center, 31 January. https://press.aboutamazon.com/2023/1/amazon-sets-a-new-record-for-most-renewable-energy-purchased-by-a-single-company
   Google Scholar
• Arboleda, M. (2020). Planetary mine: Territories of extraction under late capitalism. Verso.
   Google Scholar
• Arogyaswamy, B. (2020). Big tech and societal sustainability: an ethical framework. AI & SOCIETY, 35(4), 829–840. http://doi.org/10.1007/s00146-020-00956-6
   PubMed Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Avgerinou, M., Bertoldi, P., & Castellazzi, L. (2017). Trends in data centre energy consumption under the European code of conduct for data centre energy efficiency. Energies, 10(10), 1470. https://doi.org/10.3390/en10101470
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• AWS. (2022). Climate connections. September. https://pages.awscloud.com/rs/112-TZM-766/images/aws-climate-connections.pdf
   Google Scholar
• Baringa and Bitpower. (2022). Green data: A vision for sustainable data centres in Ireland. Last accessed 17 August 2023. https://www.baringa.com/globalassets/insights/low-carbon-futures/green-data-a-vision-for-sustainable-data-centres-in-ireland/green-data-vision-for-sustainable-data-centers-in-ireland-1.pdf
   Google Scholar
• Bitpower. (2023). “Tracking Ireland’s data hosting industry.” Bitpower Energy Solutions, June. https://bitpower.ie/index.php/dashboard
   Google Scholar
• BloombergNEF. (2021). Data centers and decarbonization unlocking flexibility in Europe’s data centers. 14 October.
   Google Scholar
• Bresnihan, P., & Brodie, P. (2021). New extractive frontiers in Ireland and the moebius strip of wind/data. Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space, 4(4), 1645–1664. https://doi.org/10.1177/2514848620970121
   Google Scholar
• Bresnihan, P., & Brodie, P. (2023). Power to the profit-makers: Letting big tech source energy directly raises questions of climate justice and democracy. The Irish Examiner, 15 September. https://www.irishexaminer.com/opinion/commentanalysis/arid-41226262.html
   Google Scholar
• Bresnihan, P., & Brodie, P. (2023). Data sinks, carbon services: Waste, storage, and energy cultures on Ireland’s peat bogs. New Media & Society, 25(2), 361–383. https://doi.org/10.1177/14614448221149948
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Bresnihan, P., & Brodie, P. (2024). From toxic industries to green extractivism: Rural environmental struggles, multinational corporations and Ireland’s postcolonial ecological regime. Irish Studies Review, 32(1), 93–122. https://doi.org/10.1080/09670882.2024.2304946
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Bresnihan, P., & Milner, N. (2023). All We want is the earth: Land, labour and movements beyond environmentalism. Bristol University Press.
   Google Scholar
• Bridge, G. (2010). Resource geographies 1: Making carbon economies, old and new. Progress in Human Geography, 35(6), 820–834. https://doi.org/10.1177/0309132510385524
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Brodie, P. (2020). Climate extraction and supply chains of data. Media, Culture & Society, 42(7-8), 1095–1114. https://doi.org/10.1177/0163443720904601
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Brodie, P. (2023). Data infrastructure studies on an unequal planet. Big Data and Society, 10(1), 1–14.
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Bruna, N. (2023). The rise of green extractivism: Extractivism, rural livelihoods and accumulation in a climate-smart world. Routledge.
   Google Scholar
• Buck, H. J. (2019). After geoengineering: Climate tragedy, repair, and restoration. Verso.
   Google Scholar
• Calma, J. (2021). Microsoft is changing the way it buys renewable energy. The Verge, 14 July. https://www.theverge.com/2021/7/14/22574431/microsoft-renewable-energy-purchases
   Google Scholar
• Carruth, A. (2014). The digital cloud and the micropolitics of energy. Public Culture, 26(2), 339–364. https://doi.org/10.1215/08992363-2392093
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Carswell, S. (2022). Data centres now consuming more electricity than rural homes – CSO. The Irish Times, 3 May. https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/data-centres-now-consuming-more-electricity-than-rural-homes-cso-1.4868221
   Google Scholar
• Celis Bueno, C., & Schultz, M. J. (2021). Data extractivism. Imaginación maquínica. http://imaginacionmaquinica.cl/data-extractivism.
   Google Scholar
• Chagnon, C. W., Durante, F., Gills, B. K., Hagolani-Albov, S. E., Hokkanen, S., Kangasluoma, S. M. J., Konttinen, H., Kröger, M., LaFleur, W., Ollinaho, O., & Vuola, M. P. S. (2022). From extractivism to global extractivism: The evolution of an organizing concept. The Journal of Peasant Studies, 49(4), 760–792. https://doi.org/10.1080/03066150.2022.2069015
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Cirefice, V., & Sullivan, L. (2019). Women on the frontlines of resistance to extractivism. Policy and Practice: A Development Education Review, 29, 78–99.
   Google Scholar
• Cloud Infrastructure Ireland. (2021). Cloud infrastructure Ireland submission to CRU proposed direction to the system operators related to data centre grid connection consultation. Commission for the Regulation of Utilities. https://cruie-live-96ca64acab2247eca8a850a7e54b-5b34f62.divio-media.com/documents/CRU21124p-Cloud-Infrastructure-Ireland-Response-to-CRU21060.pdf
   Google Scholar
• Corr, S. (2022). Growing power demand from the likes of data centres is risking Ireland's energy and climate security, report says. Irish Mirror, 6 December. https://www.irishmirror.ie/news/irish-news/growing-power-demand-likes-data-28659314
   Google Scholar
• Couldry, N., & Mejias, U. A. (2023). The decolonial turn in data and technology research: What is at stake and where is it heading? Information, Communication & Society, 26(4), 786–802. https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2021.1986102
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Cubitt, S., Hassan, R., & Volkmer, I. (2011). Does cloud computing have a silver lining? Media, Culture and Society, 33(1), 149–158.
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Curran, I. (2021). Winters of discontent? Why EirGrid is highlighting its concerns about potential power shortages. Journal.ie, 29 September. https://www.thejournal.ie/eirgrid-warning-electicity-shortage-5560734-Sep2021/
   Google Scholar
• Day One Team. (2019). Amazon announces new renewable energy project in Ireland to support AWS global infrastructure. Amazon News, 8 April. https://www.aboutamazon.eu/news/press-lounge/amazon-announces-new-renewable-energy-project-in-ireland-to-support-aws-global-infrastructure#:~:text=In%202018%2C%20AWS%20exceeded%2050,MW%20wind%20farm%20in%20Donegal
   Google Scholar
• Dunlap, A., & Correa Arce, M. (2022). ‘Murderous energy’ in Oaxaca, Mexico: Wind factories, territorial struggle and social warfare. The Journal of Peasant Studies, 49(2), 455–480. https://doi.org/10.1080/03066150.2020.1862090
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Dunlap, A., & Jakobsen, J. (2020). The violent technologies of extraction: Political ecology, critical agrarian studies and the capitalist worldeater. Palgrave.
   Google Scholar
• Dunphy, L. (2022). Ireland has to move quickly if we are to become the Saudi Arabia of wind energy. The Irish Examiner, 3 September. https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/spotlight/arid-40953404.html
   Google Scholar
• Energy Cloud. (2023). EnergyCloud Ireland launches new initiative to provide free hot water to 1,000 Irish homes using surplus renewable energy. Energy Cloud, 23 February. https://www.energycloud.org/news/new-initiative/
   Google Scholar
• Foxe, K. (2022). Data centres ‘scapegoated’ for electricity supply crisis, IDA records show. The Irish Times, 10 January. https://www.irishtimes.com/business/economy/data-centres-scapegoated-for-electricity-supply-crisis-ida-records-show-1.4772426
   Google Scholar
• Frangoul, A. (2018). Google says it’s the biggest corporate buyer of renewable energy on the planet. CNBC, 5 April. https://www.cnbc.com/2018/04/05/google-says-its-the-biggest-corporate-buyer-of-renewable-energy-on-the-planet.html
   Google Scholar
• Gabrys, J. (2011). Digital rubbish: A natural history of electronics. University of Michigan Press.
   Google Scholar
• Gago, V., & Mezzadra, S. (2017). A critique of the extractive operations of capital: Toward an expanded concept of extractivism. Rethinking Marxism, 29(4), 574–591. https://doi.org/10.1080/08935696.2017.1417087
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Gómez-Barris, M. (2017). The extractive zone: Social ecologies and decolonial perspectives. Duke University Press.
   Google Scholar
• Government of Ireland. (2022). Government statement on the role of data centres in Ireland’s enterprise strategy. July. https://enterprise.gov.ie/en/publications/publication-files/government-statement-on-the-role-of-data-centres-in-irelands-enterprise-strategy.pdf
   Google Scholar
• Gudynas, E. (2009). Diez tesis urgentes sobre el nuevo extractivismo. Extractivismo, política y sociedad. Centro Andino de Acción Popular Centro Latinoamericano de Ecología Social (pp. 187–225). http://www.rosalux.org.ec/pdfs/extractivismo.pdf#page=187
   Google Scholar
• Guo, C., Luo, F., Cai, Z., & Dong, Z. Y. (2021). Integrated energy systems of data centers and smart grids: State-of-the-art and future opportunities. Applied Energy, 301, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apenergy.2021.117474
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Hogan, M. (2018). Big data ecologies. Ephemera: Theory and Politics in Organization, 18(3), 631–657.
   Google Scholar
• Hosford, P. (2022). Data centre demands for gas connections ‘could damage Ireland’s emissions targets.’ Irish Examiner, 26 September. https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/arid-40968257.html
   Google Scholar
• Host in Ireland. (2023). Webinar: Digital infrastructure: An Irish export success. Youtube, uploaded by Host in Ireland. 29 March. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LNf2a-QOYag&t=3280s
   Google Scholar
• Host in Ireland and Bitpower. (2017). Ireland’s data hosting industry 2017. https://www.seai.ie/publications/Irelands-Data-Hosting-Industry-2017.pdf
   Google Scholar
• Howe, C., & Boyer, D. (2016). Aeolian extractivism and community wind in southern Mexico. Public Culture, 28(2), 215–235. https://doi.org/10.1215/08992363-3427427
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Hu, T. (2015). A prehistory of the cloud. MIT Press.
   Google Scholar
• Hughes, D. M. (2021). Who owns the wind? Climate crisis and the hope of renewable energy. Verso.
   Google Scholar
• IEA. (2023). Data centres and data transmission networks. International Energy Agency. Last accessed 17 August 2023. https://www.iea.org/energy-system/buildings/data-centres-and-data-transmission-networks
   Google Scholar
• Iron Mountain. (2022). “Beyond greenwashing: Sustainability meets compliance on demand webinar.” Iron Mountain, 2 November. https://www.ironmountain.com/resources/multimedia/d/data-centers-beyond-greenwashing-sustainability-meets-compliance-on-demand-webinar
   Google Scholar
• Iyer, N., Achieng, G., Borokini, F., & Ludger, U. (2021). Automated imperialism, expansionist dreams: Exploring digital extractivism in Africa. Stanford PACS: Center on Philanthrophy and Civil Society.
   Google Scholar
• Johnson, A. (2019). Emplacing data within imperial histories: Imagining Iceland as data centers’ ‘natural’ home. Culture Machine, 18, 1–12. https://culturemachine.net/vol-18-the-nature-of-data-centers/emplacing-data/.
   Google Scholar
• Kama, K. (2015). Circling the economy: Resource-making and marketization in EU electronic waste policy. Area, 47(1), 16–23. https://doi.org/10.1111/area.12143
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Knuth, S., Behrsin, I., Levenda, A., & McCarthy, J. (2022). New political ecologies of renewable energy. Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space, 5(3), 997–1013. https://doi.org/10.1177/25148486221108164
   Google Scholar
• Lally, D. (2019). The sacred fire of a data centre. Strelka Magazine. https://www.academia.edu/41096301/The_Sacred_fire_of_the_Data_Center_Strelka_Donal_Lally
   Google Scholar
• Lehuedé, S. (2022). When friction becomes the norm: Antagonism, discourse, and planetary data turbulence. New Media and Society (online first), 1–16.
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Lyon, T. P., & Montgomery, A. W. (2015). The means and end of greenwash. Organization & Environment, 28(2), 223–249. https://doi.org/10.1177/1086026615575332
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Maguire, J., & Winthereik, B. R. (2021). Digitalizing the state: Data centres and the power of exchange. Ethnos, 86(3), 530–551. https://doi.org/10.1080/00141844.2019.1660391
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Martín, T. R., & Valderrama Barragán, M. (2023). From copper mining to data extractivism? Data worth making at Chile’s data observatory foundation. Environment and Planning D: Society and Space, 41(3), 411–432. https://doi.org/10.1177/02637758231183719
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Masanet, E., Shehabi, A., Lei, N., Smith, S., & Koomey, J. (2020). Recalibrating global data center energy-use estimates. Science, 367(6481), 984–986. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aba3758
   PubMed Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Matias, Y. (2022, November 2). How we're using AI to help address the climate crisis. Google: The Keyword. https://blog.google/outreach-initiatives/sustainability/cop27-adaptation-efforts/
   Google Scholar
• Maxwell, R., & Miller, T. (2012). Greening the media. Oxford University Press.
   Google Scholar
• McLay, P. (2022). The CRU’s three criteria for the connection of data centres to the national grid. Mason Hayes and Curran, 19 January. https://www.mhc.ie/latest/insights/the-crus-3-criteria-for-the-connection-of-data-centres-to-the-national-grid
   Google Scholar
• Mercier, S., Bresnihan, P., McIlroy, D., & Barry, J. (2020). Climate action via just transitions across the island of Ireland: Labour, land and the Low-carbon transition. In D. Robbins, D. Torney, & P. Brereton (Eds.), Ireland and the climate crisis (pp. 249–268). Routledge.
   Google Scholar
• Mezzadra, S., & Neilson, B. (2013). Border as method: Or, the multiplication of labor. Duke University Press.
   Google Scholar
• Mezzadra, S., & Neilson, B. (2015). Operations of capital. South Atlantic Quarterly, 114(1), 1–9. https://doi.org/10.1215/00382876-2831246
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Microsoft AI. (n.d.). Cloud Agronomics. Last accessed 16 August 2023. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/ai/ai-for-earth-cloud-agronomics
   Google Scholar
• Microsoft News Center. (2019). Microsoft strengthens global energy portfolio with 74 megawatts of North Carolina solar power from Invenergy’s Wilkinson Solar Energy Center. Microsoft Source, 6 March. https://news.microsoft.com/2019/03/06/microsoft-strengthens-global-energy-portfolio-with-74-megawatts-of-north-carolina-solar-power-from-invenergys-wilkinson-solar-energy-center/
   Google Scholar
• Miller, T. (2017). Greenwashing culture. Routledge.
   Google Scholar
• Moore, J. W. (2022). Waste in the limits to capital: How capitalism lays waste to the Web of life, and Why It can’t stop. Emancipations: A Journal of Critical Social Analysis, 2(1), 1–45.
   Google Scholar
• Mosco, V. (2014). To the cloud: Big data in a turbulent world. Routledge.
   Google Scholar
• Moss, S. (2022). 21 Irish data centers planned outside greater Dublin, after city ban. Data Centre Dynamics, 19 December. https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/21-irish-data-centers-planned-outside-greater-dublin-after-city-ban/
   Google Scholar
• Moss, S. (2022). Microsoft signs 900MW PPAs for Ireland, 28% of nation’s target for 2030. Data Centre Dynamics, 23 November. https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/microsoft-signs-900mw-ppas-for-ireland-28-of-nations-target-for-2030/
   Google Scholar
• Not Here Not Anywhere. (n.d.). “Data centres.” Not here not anywhere. Last accessed 16 August 2023. https://notherenotanywhere.com/campaigns/data-centres/.
   Google Scholar
• Ortar, N., Taylor, A. R. E., Velkova, J., Brodie, P., Johnson, A., Marquet, C., Pollio, A., & Cirolia, L. (2023). Powering ‘smart’ futures: data centres and the energy politics of digitalisation. In S. Abram , K. Waltorp, N. Ortar, and S. Pink (Eds.), Energy Futures: Anthropocene Challenges, Emerging Technologies and Everyday Life (pp. 125–168). De Gruyter.
   Google Scholar
• Paananen, J., & Nasr, E. (2021). Grid-interactive data centers: Enabling decarbonization and system stability. Eaton. Last accessed 17 August 2023. https://www.eaton.com/content/dam/eaton/markets/data-center/eaton-microsoft-grid-interactive-whitepaper-wp153031en.pdf
   Google Scholar
• Parks, L., & Starosielski, N. (Eds.). (2016). Signal traffic: Critical studies of media infrastructures. University of Illinois Press.
   Google Scholar
• Pasek, A. (2019). Managing carbon and data flows: Fungible forms of mediation in the cloud. Culture Machine, 18, 1–15. https://culturemachine.net/vol-18-the-nature-of-data-centers/managing-carbon.
   Google Scholar
• Pasek, A. (2023). From atoms to electrons: An energy history of the future of computing. In A. Pasek, C. K. Lin, Z. G. T. Cooper, & J. B. Kinder (Eds.), Digital energetics (pp. 15–42). University of Minnesota Press.
   Google Scholar
• Prasad, R. (2022). People as data, data as oil: The digital sovereignty of the Indian state. Information, Communication & Society, 25(6), 801–815. https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2022.2056498
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Pringle, T. P. (2021). The tech ecosystem and the colony. Heliotrope, 12 May. https://www.heliotropejournal.net/helio/the-tech-ecosystem
   Google Scholar
• Ricaurte, P. (2019). Data epistemologies, the coloniality of power, and resistance. Television & New Media, 220(4), 350–365. https://doi.org/10.1177/1527476419831640
   Google Scholar
• Rikap, C., & Durand, C. (n.d.). Capitalism in the age of intellectual monopoly. IT for change: State of big tech. https://projects.itforchange.net/state-of-big-tech/state-of-big-tech-capitalism-in-the-age-of-intellectual-monopoly/
   Google Scholar
• Riofrancos, T. (2020). Resource radicals: From petro-nationalism to post-extractivism in Ecuador. Duke University Press.
   Google Scholar
• Roach, J. (2022). Microsoft datacenter batteries to support growth of renewables on the power grid. Microsoft Source, 7 July. https://news.microsoft.com/source/features/sustainability/ireland-wind-farm-datacenter-ups/
   Google Scholar
• Rone, J. (2023). The shape of the cloud: Contesting data centre construction in North Holland. New Media & Society (online first), https://doi.org/10.1177/14614448221145928
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Sadowski, J., & Levenda, A. (2020). The anti-politics of smart energy regimes. Political Geography, 81, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.polgeo.2020.102202
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Sareen, S., & Müller, K. (Eds.). (2023). Digitisation and low-carbon energy transitions. Palgrave Macmillan.
   Google Scholar
• Siemens. (2019, January 23). Kamstrup and Siemens to roll out large-scale smart metering project in Ireland. Siemens. https://press.siemens.com/global/en/pressrelease/kamstrup-and-siemens-roll-out-large-scale-smart-metering-projectireland#:~: text=A%20Kamstrup%2DSiemens%20consortium%20will,for%20execution%20during%202019%2D2020.
   Google Scholar
• Siemens. (2023, June 20). Offaly in the Irish Midlands ready to rival Europe's key cities as green data centre hub. Siemens. https://www.siemens.com/ie/en/company/news/offaly-county-council.html.
   Google Scholar
• Starosielski, N. (2016). The undersea network. Duke University Press.
   Google Scholar
• Steinhoff, J. (2018). Cognition on tap: capital’s theory of AI as utility. Digital Culture & Society, 4(2), 89–104. https://doi.org/10.14361/dcs-2018-0206
   Google Scholar
• Swinhoe, D. (2021). Heatworks breaks ground on AWS district heating scheme in Dublin, Ireland. Data centre dynamics, 18 June. https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/heatworks-breaks-ground-on-aws-district-heating-scheme-in-dublin-ireland/
   Google Scholar
• Taffel, S. (2023). Data and oil: Metaphor, materiality and metabolic rifts. New Media & Society, 25(5), 980–998. https://doi.org/10.1177/14614448211017887
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Tsing, A. (2015). The mushroom at the end of the world: On the possibility of life in capitalist ruins. Princeton University Press.
   Google Scholar
• Upham, P., Sovacool, B. K., & Monyei, C. G. (2022). Imaginaries on ice: Sociotechnical futures of data centre development in Norway and Iceland. Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space, https://doi.org/10.1177/25148486221126619
   Google Scholar
• Varro, L., & Kamiya, G. (2021). 5 ways big tech could have big impacts on clean energy transitions. International Energy Agency, 25 March. https://www.iea.org/commentaries/5-ways-big-tech-could-have-big-impacts-on-clean-energy-transitions
   Google Scholar
• Vaughan, H., Pasek, A., Silcox, N. R., & Starosielski, N. (2023). Culture of sustainability and discourses of social change. Journal of Language and Politics, 22(5), 640–660. https://doi.org/10.1075/jlp.22125.vau
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Velkova, J. (2021). Thermopolitics of data: Cloud infrastructures and energy futures. Cultural Studies, 35(4-5), 663–683. https://doi.org/10.1080/09502386.2021.1895243
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Velkova, J., Magnusson, D., & Rohracher, H. (2022). Smart thermostats and the algorithmic control of thermal comfort. In S. Pink, M. Berg, D. Lupton, & M. Ruckenstein (Eds.), Everyday automation: Experiencing and anticipating emerging technologies (pp. 171–183). Routledge.
   Google Scholar
• Vonderau, A. (2019). Storing data, infrastructuring the Air: Thermocultures of the cloud. Culture machine 18. https://culturemachine.net/vol-18-the-nature-of-data-centers/storing-data/
   Google Scholar
• Voskoboynik, D. M., & Andreucci, D. (2022). Greening extractivism: Environmental discourses and resource governance in the ‘Lithium Triangle.’. Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space, 5(2), https://doi.org/10.1177/25148486211006345
   Google Scholar
• Wade, R., & Ellis, G. (2022). Reclaiming the windy commons: Landownership, wind rights, and the assetization of renewable resources. Energies, 15(10), 3744. https://doi.org/10.3390/en15103744
   Web of Science ®Google Scholar
• Watts, L. (2018). Energy at the end of the world: An orkney islands saga. MIT Press.
   Google Scholar
• Yusoff, K. (2018). A billion black anthropocenes or none. University of Minnesota Press.
   Google Scholar