4.4.4.1 Introduction

The digital revolution describes the major restructuring of all domains of social life and of the economy as firms and consumers take advantage of new digital technologies – i.e. ubiquitous connected consumer devices such as mobile phones (Grubler et al.,2018), global internet infrastructure and access (World Bank, 2014), computing devices, sensors and digital communication technologies (Verma et al., 2020). Digital technologies have extraordinary enabling powers: they provide access to information, contribute to forming preferences, modify demand choices, and change the way in which goods and services are provided and accessed (IEA, 2017, Nakicenovic et al., 2018).

This subchapter discusses  the enabling role that digital technologies and devices can play in the context of PTPs (Lenton et al., 2022). Addressing this topic is important given the lively debate on whether the digital revolution will contribute to the achievement of a low-carbon, sustainable future or whether the rapid diffusion of digital technologies will simply exacerbate existing economic and social inequalities both within and across countries (Nakicenovic et al., 2018; Nature, 2020). Indeed, the ‘twin green and digital transformation’ is increasingly referred to as a challenge of unprecedented breadth and depth, scale and speed (European Commission, 2020;  IPCC, 2022; Verdolini, 2023). 

Digitalisation has myriad possible applications that can be utilised to accelerate socio-economic transformations towards a post-carbon, regenerative society and we cannot cover all possible benefits. We focus on three specific examples: teleworking, MaaS and smart homes, given their relevance for the case studies presented in 4.3.1 and 4.3.2.3.