In the Face of ESG Backlash, How Can Sustainable Solutions Become Widely Accepted?
Thu 29 May 2025
With ESG under political pressure and AI’s environmental impact under the spotlight, the road to sustainable IT adoption is far from straightforward. Yet for businesses focused on cost, compliance, and performance, sustainable solutions can still win—when they solve real problems.
In this feature, Charlotte Nixon, Content & Campaigns Manager at Techbuyer, explores why refurbished tech, energy efficiency, and circular practices are gaining traction not just for their green credentials, but because they work. When sustainability delivers on reliability, value, and usability, adoption follows.
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With the growth of AI and its environmental consequences, as well as the changing political sphere, many people are left wondering what the future of sustainable development in the IT sector will look like in future years.
Unfortunately, a lot of the uncertainty surrounding sustainability currently comes from pressures from political individuals and groups, with ESG under attack in the US: key companies have been removing themselves from sustainability alliances out of fear of repercussions from political bodies.
Similarly, it was also recently reported that experts in the sustainability sphere state that the 2050 Net Zero goal is impossible – so how do companies looking to promote sustainability compete?
The answer comes in a not-too radical solution – create services and products that work. And not just work for sustainable development, but meet the real-life demands, needs and priorities of your customers. As much as we would like to say that each company is out there searching for the most environmentally friendly services and products, it’s just not always the case.
As a supplier of sustainable IT solutions, the majority of our customers come to us to maximise their IT budget through the second-hand market, create performance-driven IT infrastructure solutions, find hard to source parts, or remain complaint with industry regulations (to name but a few).
How do Sustainable Solutions Become Widely Adopted?
In the past few years, we’ve seen impressive developments that have managed to bridge the political and commercial gaps and see success by offering a viable, environmentally
This demonstrates the principal that, for sustainability ventures to succeed and become widely adopted globally, even against the rising tide of backlash that they’re facing, environmental best practice must almost be a by-product of an otherwise comprehensive solution.
The Growth of the Refurbished Market | Adopting Circularity
The circular economy was introduced in the 1970s and is now a common aspiration for many working in the sustainability field. But the second-hand market pre-existed this idea.
As a business ourselves, circularity is something that Techbuyer aims to address and promote. However, we began as a specialist in refurbished technology, promoting high-quality devices for a fraction of the cost of new solutions.
It was in this industry that we became experts, proving that refurbished can, and will, perform as well as new, when done right.
And whilst refurbishment is a cornerstone of the circular economy, the majority of customers who consider second-hand view the sustainability side of solutions as an added benefit rather than the reason behind their choice.
The refurbished IT market has grown exponentially over the past 20 years and is expected to reach a value of £7.2 billion ($9.75 billion) by 2034, growing at a compound annual growth rate of 7.34%. Whilst its growth aligns well with sustainability messaging and aspirations, many consider refurbished for other reasons, including cost and sourcing legacy equipment.
The global pandemic of 2020 saw many turn to refurbished as the manufacturing of new devices slowed. This did well for proving the reliability and performance of second-hand devices, as many didn’t have a choice in the hardware they could source.
The choices made to consider refurbished came down to price, performance, reliability and availability, in other words, it met their needs and demands. Sustainability and making the environmental choice, in many cases, are therefore benefits that can be explained and communicated with the customers off the back of receiving a viable solution. Getting the solution right first, however, is the most important thing.
Sustainability and Efficiency
Refurbishment is only one example of how sustainable solutions and products can meet the demands of businesses. In fact, many sustainable best practices bring other benefits to a company that can make them more appealing to customers, whilst also hitting their priorities.
Energy efficiency is a term used so frequently within the sustainability sphere, particularly when it comes to IT hardware and data centre equipment. However, energy efficiency is often sought after by customers of IT hardware due to the cost savings achieved and the boost in device performance.
Improving the configuration and cooling of a device, as well as looking at the efficiency of wider infrastructure and maintenance environment, allows companies to not only decrease their carbon footprint, but also reduce energy costs and enhance device performance.
Therefore, within the IT sphere, companies wanting to provide energy efficiency from a sustainable standpoint must develop an expertise in the field and demonstrate that what they offer delivers the best solution against all metrics: cost, performance, reliability and carbon. Only then will the solution become widely accepted.
Sustainability Doesn’t Mean Compromise
The adoption of sustainable habits, practices and products may be under attack within the US political sphere, but solutions that deliver cost savings, buyer freedom, exceptional performance and reliability will never face the same scrutiny. By working these elements into sustainable solutions and meeting the demands of the market, sustainable solutions can gain a competitive edge – they have that one thing that no other solution can offer, environmental benefit.
If done right, sustainable IT products and services aren’t just a niche area of a globally booming market, they can drive real change, reducing our impact on the environment without compromising the needs of the business world.
This is the best marketing that sustainability can have. Demonstrating that ESG doesn’t have to mean compromise should be the aim of every company looking for success in the sustainability sector. Ensuring that your product or service delivers against the needs of the clients is intrinsic to wide scale adoption at this time.
About the author
As Content and Campaigns Manager at Techbuyer, Charlotte is responsible for the creation and execution of marketing campaigns and content strategies across all Techbuyer departments. With a passion for both content creation and sustainability, Charlotte plays a key role in ensuring that all campaigns are effectively aligned with Techbuyer’s goals. Charlotte holds a Foundation in Environmental Management certification and is currently working towards becoming a registered environmentalist, further deepening her expertise and commitment to sustainability. Her dedication to the environment and ability to merge sustainability with marketing make her a key player in promoting environmental responsibility.
