Tim Prosser

For Tim Prosser, the cloud is anything but weightless. As founder of Sustainably Digital, his work begins with a simple but uncomfortable truth: behind every stream, every query, every AI inference sits physical infrastructure — servers, cooling systems, and cables — consuming energy and generating emissions. "Naming that reality," he says, "is where accountability begins."

With over two decades of experience across financial services, energy, defence, and climate tech, Tim focuses on something most organisations haven't yet grappled with: the hidden environmental cost of their digital operations. The dominant approach — multiplying IT spend by average emission factors — is fast, but materially inaccurate. It masks the true scale of the problem. Tim's work pushes organisations toward activity-based measurement, accurate technology emissions baselines, and confronting what he calls the Scope 3 black box that technology vendors routinely hide behind.

A UK study tour proved to be a turning point. Sitting alongside leading climate scientists and digital sustainability practitioners from around the world, the direction of travel became clear: this field is maturing fast, driven not just by net-zero ambition but by regulation and an increasingly powerful force — procurement. Buyers are beginning to demand emissions transparency from their technology suppliers, and that changes everything.

When engaging stakeholders, Tim leads with ROI rather than compliance. His go-to example is zombie servers — idle cloud resources silently consuming energy and money around the clock. Identifying and switching them off reduces both operating costs and carbon emissions, immediately, with no trade-off. It's the kind of story that gets a CFO's attention, and it reflects Tim's broader conviction that sustainability and operational efficiency aren't in tension — they're the same conversation.

He draws inspiration from the Seventh Generation Principle of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy — the idea that every decision today must sustain the world seven generations into the future. Applied to technology, it is a direct challenge to throwaway culture and planned obsolescence. It also resonates with te ao Māori, where data is taonga — a treasure to be stewarded, not a commodity to be discarded.

Aotearoa's superpower, in Tim's view, is its low-carbon energy grid. With an APAC-leading rating for grid carbon intensity, New Zealand has a genuine competitive advantage and the foundations to become a regional model for clean cloud infrastructure. That opportunity, he believes, deserves to be claimed far more deliberately.

If Tim could plant one seed for the future, it would be sustainability as a design constraint — embedded into every technology architecture from day one, before a single line of code is written.

Read Tim's answers to Blooming Sustainability to explore how digital operations, data transparency, and smarter infrastructure choices can become a powerful lever for climate action.

BLOOMING  Sustainability Questionnaire

Name: Tim Prosser

Company & Title: Sustainably Digital, Founder / Director

Website & LinkedIn Profile: www.sustainably-digital.com www.linkedin.com/in/timprosser

* Guiding Values | Kaupapa

If sustainability were a flower blooming in your life, what would it look like? What nurtures it?
It would be a resilient, deeply interconnected ecosystem — nurtured by high-quality data, transparency, and genuine collaboration. It thrives when IT, Finance, and Sustainability professionals work together through what I call the Sustainability Value Triangle: translating raw data into strategic insight and tangible commercial value.

A quote, personal motto or whakataukī that reflects your vision:
"You can't manage what you don't measure." But the one I return to most is this: Information Technology has a weight. We need to retire dangerous euphemisms like 'The Cloud' or ‘virtual’ that imply our digital economy is weightless. Behind every stream, every query, every AI inference sits physical infrastructure — servers, cooling systems, and cables — consuming energy and generating emissions. Naming that reality is where accountability begins.

If you could mentor a rising change-maker in Aotearoa, what advice would you share?
Don't go it alone. Build a cross-functional coalition — IT, Finance, and Sustainability — and present a unified business case. Siloed efforts rarely move organisations. And don't let imperfect data paralyse you. "Best effort" data is enough to make directionally correct decisions. Waiting for 100% accuracy before acting isn't rigor — it's delay.

* Leading Change | Arataki

A key moment in your journey that shaped your path:
A UK study tour proved to be a turning point. Sitting across from leading climate scientists and digital sustainability practitioners from around the world, it became undeniable: this field is maturing fast — driven not just by net-zero ambition, but by compliance obligations, regulation, and an increasingly powerful force: procurement. Buyers are starting to demand emissions transparency from their technology suppliers, and that changes everything.

What’s the main challenge you face in driving sustainability within your sector?
The central challenge is breaking out of the spend-based estimation trap — and forcing open the Scope 3 black box that technology vendors hide behind. Most organisations still calculate their digital footprint by multiplying IT spend by average emission factors. It's fast, but it's materially inaccurate — and it masks the true scale of the problem. We need industry to shift toward tracking actual, activity-based consumption, and to demand granular, workload-level emissions data from vendors. Right now, that data largely doesn't exist, or isn't shared. That must change.

An area you need more support with:
We urgently need to mobilise the 1.2+ million ICT professionals across Aotearoa and Australia as active co-leads in our sustainability transition — not as bystanders. Sustainability practitioners are doing exceptional work defining ESG strategies and science-based targets. But execution depends on technical architecture, and that lives in IT. With 77% of Chief Sustainability Officers citing integrated data systems as their top unmet need, and the digital sector responsible for 2–4% of global emissions, we cannot afford to keep these two communities working in parallel rather than together.

An Indigenous perspective you admire and want people to be mindful of:
One perspective I return to often is the Seventh Generation Principle of the Native American Haudenosaunee Confederacy — the commitment that every decision today must sustain the world seven generations into the future. Applied to technology, it is a direct challenge to throwaway culture. Planned obsolescence, e-waste, and unchecked emissions are not just environmental issues — they are intergenerational injustices. It also resonates deeply within Aotearoa's own context. In te ao Māori, data is not a commodity — it is taonga, a treasure to be protected and stewarded. Both traditions ask the same question of us: are we designing and consuming technology in a way our great-great-grandchildren would be grateful for? That question should be discussed in every boardroom conversation about digital transformation.

Your best approach for engaging stakeholders in meaningful dialogue about ESG:
Shift the narrative from sustainability as a compliance cost to a driver of resilience, efficiency, and enterprise value. My go-to example: zombie servers. Idle or underutilised cloud resources silently consume energy and money around the clock. Identifying and decommissioning/right sizing them reduces operating costs and carbon emissions — immediately, with no trade-off. That's the story that gets a CFO's attention. When sustainability professionals can walk into a room and speak in the language of operational efficiency and ROI, the conversation changes completely.

What do you think is Aotearoa’s superpower in creating a sustainable future?
Aotearoa's superpower is its low-carbon energy grid — a powerful mix of hydro, geothermal, and wind — and what that means for the digital sector. New Zealand's cloud environments currently hold an APAC-leading 'B' rating for grid carbon intensity. Against a backdrop of fossil-fuel-dependent grids across much of Asia-Pacific — including Australia — that's a genuine competitive advantage. Aotearoa has the foundations to become a regional model for clean cloud infrastructure, and we should be far more deliberate about claiming that mantle.

 * Surfing the Green Wave | Kakariki

Books, podcasts, courses or other resources that profoundly shaped your approach to sustainability:
I highly recommend the Sustainable IT Playbook (2nd Edition) by Niklas Sundberg & Richard Pastore — a practical, no-nonsense guide to scaling sustainable IT strategies.

For broader inspiration, The Ministry for the Future by Kim Stanley Robinson is essential reading: a cli-fi novel that makes the stakes of climate inaction viscerally real while imagining genuinely hopeful pathways forward.

For podcasts, The Green Fix is a standout — fortnightly insights at the intersection of sustainability, business, and technology. Be sure to tune in to episodes 27 & 28 for a two-part deep dive into digital sustainability and data centres.

And finally… Nat Bullard's annual decarbonisation slide deck is a must-read for anyone tracking the macro trajectory.

Events in Aotearoa or globally that you think are must-attend:
Globally, I'd encourage people to get involved in the growing Climate Action Week movement — community-led activations now running in cities including Sydney, Adelaide, New York, San Francisco and London. These are genuinely energising spaces for cross-sector connection and accountability.

A sustainable initiative or project in Aotearoa that deserves more attention:
One initiative deserving far more attention is the Green Rural Connectivity & Local Data Centres (GRCLDC) project — a proposal to deploy renewable-powered, community-owned data centres in rural Aotearoa, paired with digital services like telehealth, education, and e-government. This matters because rural and iwi communities face serious digital equity gaps, and GRCLDC addresses them while building emissions-efficient infrastructure from the ground up. It creates local jobs, builds technical capability, and demonstrates that sustainability and inclusion are not competing goals. It's a replicable blueprint — and it deserves national attention.

If your work could plant one seed of change for the future, what would it be?
To make sustainability a design constraint, not an afterthought — embedded into every enterprise technology architecture and AI deployment from day one. Right now, most organisations fix problems downstream. I want to see energy efficiency, hardware circularity, and right-sizing built into the brief before a single line of code is written or a server is provisioned. The most sustainable system is the one you design well from the start.

The leader(s) you endorse for a future edition of Blooming Sustainability:
Nic Seaton, CEO at Parents for Climate, who is a driving force in holding major corporates to account, initially in the energy sector. Parents for Climate is a grassroots movement of parents and caregivers united by a shared concern for their children's future. Driven by love and responsibility, members advocate for bold climate action, pushing governments and communities to protect the world their kids will inherit.

 * One actionable takeaway for our readers to make a change today for a brighter tomorrow:
Audit your digital dead weight — today.

Identify and decommission idle cloud resources, unused software licenses, and end-of-life devices sitting in storage. You don't need a sustainability strategy or a consultant to start. Open your cloud billing dashboard, look for resources with near-zero utilisation, and turn them off. You'll cut costs and carbon simultaneously — and you'll have your first data point for a technology emissions baseline. That's how a journey of a thousand miles begins.

Another effective action you can take to reduce your digital carbon footprint today is to prolong the lifespan of your hardware (PC’s, Laptops, Mobile Phone, Computer Monitors). Approximately 80% of a device's total carbon footprint is generated during the manufacturing phase—long before the device is ever turned on. By simply shifting a laptop refresh cycle from four years to five years, you can reduce annualised emissions by 20% to 33%.

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