I am proud to announce my appointment to the Australian Computer Society’s (ACS) inaugural Sustainability Technical Committee for a two-year term.

As the Founding Director of Sustainably Digital, my mission is to help organisations uncover the hidden environmental costs of their technology operations. Through this new committee, I will collaborate with leading industry and academic experts to shape national standards, address ESG goals, and tackle urgent challenges like AI energy demands and e-waste. It is time for ICT professionals to own their environmental impact and make digital sustainability measurable, credible, and actionable.

The 2025 Global Sustainability Barometer reveals a critical mandate for ANZ technology and sustainability leaders: transition from ambitious net-zero targets to tangible execution.

As the line between environmental responsibility and business performance vanishes, proving measurable ROI has become the primary catalyst for momentum. To succeed, organisations must transform IT into an enterprise-wide sustainability engine rather than operating in silos. Furthermore, leveraging advanced technologies like Predictive and Agentic AI is essential for moving from reactive reporting to autonomous, data-driven optimisation. However, leaders must first overcome significant data integration barriers to build unified platforms that drive real-time insights and competitive advantage.

The 2025 Australian Climate Tech Industry Report signals that the sector has moved beyond early-stage innovation to focus on the essential "one to one hundred" scaling phase necessary for deep decarbonisation.

This momentum is supported by significant capital flow, with over $680 million in Venture Capital raised in 2025, and a growing workforce of more than 7,000 people.

For enterprise, the introduction of mandatory climate-related reporting for approximately 6,000 Australian companies is a primary driver, forcing a strategic shift towards evidence-based solutions. However, scaling capital-intensive deep tech requires overcoming the reliance on offtake agreements ("If you build it, we will buy it"), which are identified as the missing link for securing financing and commercialising innovations.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is rapidly emerging as one of the defining forces of the decade, standing alongside the urgent global challenge of climate change. With worldwide AI investment forecast to exceed US$600 billion by 2028, AI's massive appetite for computational power creates a significant environmental footprint that Australian IT leaders can no longer ignore.

The acceleration of AI workloads is straining resources globally and locally: Energy and Emissions, Water Consumption and E-Waste.

For Australian organisations, sustainable AI adoption is a critical strategic imperative. The goal is to pursue innovation through sustainability, ensuring that our digital evolution supports, rather than undermines, our climate commitments.