OASIS wins IRMS Digital Decarbonisation award

On Monday 19th May, at the Information and Records Management Society (IRMS) Awards 2025, we were delighted to take home the inaugural Digital Decarbonisation in Action award.

In the words of the IRMS, “The Digital Decarbonisation in Action award is a new award that shines a light on the critical role of information and records managers and teams in reducing emissions associated with inefficient data practices. The inaugural recipient of the award is OASIS Group, which demonstrated to the judging panel how its digital decarbonisation initiatives are improving how data is created, processed, and stored to help achieve sustainability and economic goals within the organisation.”

Winning an award is always a fantastic achievement, but this one feels particularly special. Digital decarbonisation is a pressing topic which drives much of what we do here at OASIS.

Who’s examining the digital impact?

While environmentally-friendly practices are a priority in the records management industry, the vast majority of data gathered and discussed on the topic relates to paper-based processes. Records management suppliers offer energy-efficient storage options, scan files to be shared digitally rather transporting them in vans, and wherever possible, help organisations shift from paper to digital.

But what about the energy being used to fuel digital processes? Who is examining the impact of that on our planet, in relation to records and information management?

Back in 2024 we realised these were questions that needed urgent answers

We initiated a programme of work to:

1.  Understand how digital data created through records management contributes to organisations’ carbon footprint
2.  Use the information to design new, sustainability-focused products and services and refocus existing services
3. Share the information more widely to:
   • Increase awareness of the topic among clients and industry peers
   • Promote more sustainable records managemenT

As part of this project, we commissioned a whitepaper, ‘The Impact of Digital Decarbonisation in Records and Information Management’.

The whitepaper demonstrates that creating, storing and managing digital data is placing an increasing burden on the planet. Data centres now have a larger carbon footprint than the aviation industry – but a structured approach to information management can reduce organisations’ emissions.

Aligning our services

With the help of the whitepaper findings, we created a methodology covering each aspect of digital decarbonisation:

• Understanding data: what data is held, where is it sourced and how much is ‘dark’
  • Helping clients map their end-to-end information management strategies
  • Auditing data to reduce the amount of unnecessary data being digitised (for one client, we reduced 35,000 records to 7,000 records
• Classifying data: cataloguing and using robust retention and destruction strategies to optimise energy use
  • Comprehensive indexing and tagging with metadata to make it easy to find information and to apply automated governance procedures

• Managing data: looking at data-sharing across supply chains, integrating physical and digital strategies and tiered storage approaches
  • balancing the right blend of physical and digital support to minimise carbon footprint
  • Introducing specialist Microsoft storage technology that minimises the risk of data duplication
  • initiatives that not only improve sustainability, but also save costs, increase efficiency and improve security

The team also aligned existing services, or implemented new ones, to support activities in each area.

Spreading the word

Our marketing team launched a campaign to raise awareness of the environmental issues surrounding digital information management and how to operate more sustainably.

At the core of the campaign was a hybrid in-person and online event held in London on 5th December 2024. The event generated over 50 registrations from CEOs, CTOs, CIOS, environmental and sustainability leads across organisations

The work goes on

We took a moment to celebrate our award win at the IRMS gala dinner, but for us it’s the first step in an ongoing process. We’re proud of what we’ve achieved so far and there’s much more to come – watch this space!