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Report: Hours spent streaming in 2020 led to sea ice loss the size of Scotland

A new study from Blackbird looks at how cloud technologies can help decarbonise video production

Blackbird has released a new study looking at how cloud technologies can help decarbonise video production.

The study has been published in collaboration with environmental consultancy Green Element.

According to the company, the study highlights that whilst considerable gains have been made across the media industry due to the rise of remote production and adoption of cloud based solutions, broadcasters can go much further and faster by integrating authentically sustainable, native technologies specifically optimised for cloud workflows.

Key findings of the study include:

  • in 2020, 480 billion hours of live video streaming led to sea ice loss the size of Scotland
  • 90 per cent of editors are using the cloud but 65 per cent are inefficiently and needlessly moving large files around
  • a recent ground-breaking live sports cloud production led by IBC evidenced that cloud workflows reduce power and infrastructure requirements by 70 per cent

“A year ago, Blackbird adopted a leadership position by campaigning for a reduction in highly polluting on premise workflows by employing cloud technology in our paper Video Shouldn’t Cost the Earth,” said Blackbird CEO Ian McDonough. “Much progress has been made in this area as awareness and technology have improved.”

“In our latest paper, we see that despite these improvements there is still a very high prevalence of cloud-based technology which does not utilise the key efficiencies of the cloud, particularly those of power and carbon consumption. The rise of cloud native solutions such as Blackbird can help reduce carbon emissions at source, dispensing the need for carbon capture technology or offsets costs.”

The full report is available to download here.