Navigating the terrain of sustainable HCI

A map of the current landscape of sustainable HCI that differentiates and organizes the approaches that have emerged in the field and describes emerging topics of dissension are discussed. A dominant genre in sustainable HCI is persuasive technology: systems that attempt to convince users to behave in a more sustainable way. The forms of these systems range from devices and physical artifacts to visualizations to instrumented environments and intelligent agents. Sustainable interaction design (SID) uses sustainability as a lens to rethink the role and outcomes of design. Differences arise around how to approach users and their lifestyles. There is even a noticeable lack of connection between sustainable HCI and other technical fields. These issues prompt questions of what the boundaries of sustainable HCI are or should be. There is a clear need for sustainable HCI to draw on the expertise of researchers in areas such as hardware, environmental information systems, and community information systems, and there is also a clear need for HCI expertise in those areas.