The Internet has a massive environmental impact. According to some estimates, it generates 1.6 billion annual tons in greenhouse gas emissions. The good news is that Sustainable Web design can help mitigate some of that footprint.
The best Sustainable Web design framework I’ve seen so far is introduced by Tim Frick and his Mightybites team. Initially they listed four main sustainable components but have recently added two more. I’ll list them in the order of the control we have as UX designers have.
UX design & usability
Best practices of UX design are sustainable by default - enabling customers to fulfill their needs by completing tasks quickly and efficiently. This comes down to minimizing cognitive overload, removing potential distractions, making navigation easy to understand, using design patterns that reflect mental models, avoiding dark patterns, using user research to make informed design decisions and designing for accessibility.
Findability, SEO & content strategy
Content governance practices also matter a lot because they allow us to maintain a sustainable content strategy long term. It may surprise some people to know that Search engine optimization (SEO) is not only a buzzword in marketing but also a sustainable solution. Can people easily find your content through search engines? What about your internal website search? Can people find content on your website easily? As Tim Frick worded,
Better SEO/search on site = content found more quickly = less energy used = more sustainable.
Content strategy is another pillar of sustainable design. Does your content empower people to make more sustainable choices in terms of printing or shipping? Here are some examples and design patterns that you might find inspirational.
Backcountry website introduces responsible filters
Gunas website encourages to offset carbon at checkout
Web performance optimization (WPO)
Web performance optimization is about loading website pages quickly without sacrificing user experience. It revolves around questions like: how fast does my website load? Does optimization undermine usability? Does a product work well for people with disabilities?
Products and services in Sustainable Web design are ideally speedy and reliable because this way they use fewer energy to fulfill user needs. And your customers will thank you for it - as studies show, most people will leave a website that takes longer than 2 seconds to load.
Javascript is another culprit that designers need to be aware of. It adds interactivity but in recent years has exploded both in size and execution time. In some sites with React, it can take up to 20 seconds to load and execute on a mobile device.
You can test your website loading speed in many tools - check out Pingdom Website Speed Test or Website Carbon Calculator to check and troubleshoot your website’s energy leaks.
Website Carbon Calculator will help you find and troubleshoot your website’s energy leaks
A great example of a sustainable website is from a sustainable fashion brand Organic Basics from Denmark. It minimizes power consumption on the devices; doesn't load any images before they are requested by people; adapts to reflect the amount of renewable energy it’s currently running on; informs people about the impact of their browsing behavior; doesn't use videos; stores data locally on the devices; compresses all data; loads only the most crucial programming scripts, frameworks and cookies; limits the amount of light emitted by the screen; optimizes and limits the use of custom fonts. Amazing, isn’t it?
Sustainable components & Green Web hosting
Most of the carbon emissions in IT come from data centers - facilities that are used to house servers and computer systems. That’s why hosting digital products and services on servers that are powered by 100% renewable energy is one of the most important things businesses can do to become sustainable. Unfortunately, we do not have much control over it as UX designers). Some of the top green hosting providers in 2021 are GreenGeeks, DreamHost, and iPage.
GreenGeeks Landing page offering green hosting
Besides Web hosting, other sustainable components can be energy-efficient frameworks, environmentally-friendly workspaces, content delivery networks, and shared code libraries.
Client and project ethos
Of course, we probably won’t be able to put a checkmark in sustainable website design if our design practices are not aligned with the company or project’s overall commitment to sustainability. Does a company’s overall vision advocate for a sustainable future? Is communication between the stakeholders built on trust and complete transparency? Do you organize your project workflow sustainably?
Sustainable business practices
What are your client’s actual actions when it comes to addressing the world’s sustainability problems? Do they make an effort to address e-waste and other dark sides of digital transformation? Have the management team heard of the term Corporate Digital Responsibility?
To sum up, Sustainable Web Design is our best solution right now to reduce the environmental impact of the digital world. While a lot of it might be out of reach for UX designers, there are still many tools we can use - with determination, passion, and patience.