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NeoGAFs Kent Brockman
What Is The Environmental Impact Of The Gaming Industry? One Researcher Wants To Find Out
A researcher from Australia is looking into the environmental impact of video games and wants to know what developers think about climate change.
www.gamespot.com
A researcher in Australia want to know: What is the environmental impact of the video game industry, and what do game developers themselves think about their carbon footprint?
Researcher Dr. Ben Abraham from the University of Technology in Sydney (UTS) is calling on game developers to weigh in as part of a new research project that aims to "create a snapshot of the energy intensity of contemporary video game development in the workplace where games are actually made."
To do this, Abraham is looking for first-hand information from game development studios regarding their carbon emissions policies and practices.
In addition to that kind of numerical data, the study is looking for respondents to speak about the "attitudes of game developers towards the potential environmental impacts of their work." The survey is asking for developers to discuss their level of interest and concern about climate change and carbon emissions that are created by the game development industry.
"This research is being conducted to find out about the energy use and associated carbon emissions of digital game production both in individual workplaces and across the sector as a whole," reads a line from the survey. "The research aims to find out what game developers are doing to reduce their carbon footprint in order to inform future research and policy decisions that aim to support sustainable game development practices."
Abraham is looking to collect information about the energy usage of a game studio, what workplace policies might be in place regarding carbon emissions, and policies about other environmental issues such as recycling and powering off computers at night.
Abraham said developers can take part in the survey without identifying themselves or their employer if that is of concern, though he added it may not always be possible to protect the identity of participants.
