SUBSEA PTC 2024: A REVIEW FROM GEN Z BY MICHAEL BRAND, ISABELLE CHERRY, ELLA HERBERT, AND ISABEL JIJON
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or our small group of undergraduate students, the first few steps walking into PTC 24 felt like a jump into the deep end of the telecommunications industry. The four of us had come here from the University of California, Berkeley. Before we began working for the SubOptic Foundation’s Sustainable Subsea Networks research team, we had never even known about subsea internet cables, data centers, and the maritime industry. What we had thought about, though, was how our young generation was going to fight climate change and make our built environment more sustainable. We had joined Sustainable Subsea Networks in the hope of finding new ways to reduce the carbon emissions of what, we learned, was critical infrastructure. Since August each of us had been working diligently to learn all we could about the history and importance of the digital infrastructure industries–especially the subsea cable sector. By the time PTC rolled around in January, we were eager to learn about how this critical industry could do its part to halt the escalating climate crisis. Each of us sat dutifully at a variety of sessions across the days of the conference, typing frantically to record as much information as possible about the state of the industry and its sustainability initiatives.
But before this, much to our surprise, at the very first session our group was spotlighted for our young age and the novelty of our research. It became apparent to us that this industry welcomed young, creative minds who were unafraid to propose new ideas to address the increasingly complicated environmental challenges that the world faces. In the later sessions of PTC, many people mentioned that sustainability was important. What we were looking for was a clear and detailed plan to achieve it – we hope we can help be part of that plan. After attending PTC, we felt inspired and confident that our generation, and young people more broadly, will be capable of addressing the challenges that the industry
faces. Below we describe some of these challenges, including power generation, artificial intelligence, and geopolitics, that were discussed at the conference. These challenges, from our perspective, are all connected to the issue of sustainability, which is both affected by power, technology, and politics, and will shape their future. We hope to grow with the industry into the next chapter of its development – one where careful approaches to sustainable initiatives, economics, and politics can all be implemented together.
THE SHIFTING LANDSCAPE OF POWER GENERATION
Power is at the heart of sustainable development, and throughout the MARCH 2024 | ISSUE 135 9