Inspiration
While researching, we realized that digital storage, such as emails, actually contribute to a negtive environmental impact, and can affect the carbon dioxide emissions generated. Each email is stored in a data center, and that data center consumes large amounts of electricity. This electricity are recieved from power plants, which release large amounts of cabron dioxide.
What it does
Carbon Cache is a chrome web extension that reveals the hidden carbon footprint of your digital storage. By securely connecting to your google drive and email, it calculates the carbon emissions associated with the user’s digital storage. Additionally, it also shows how much carbon the user could reduce by cleaning up unnecessary files. Carbon Cache makes digital storage impact visible and makes it easy to contribute towards the environment.
How we built it
We built Carbon Cache primarily through frontend; specifically, we used languages such as HTML + CSS and JavaScript. Purposely, we did not include backend because Google's servers already contain the necessary data, and databases are uneccessary for the purpose and function of Carbon Cache.
Challenges we ran into
We ran into a few challenges related to the the technical and logical aspect of the project. One of the main problems was calculating a formula to estimate the amount of carbon dioxide produced based on the digital storage of the user. However, we resolved this issue by coming up with a formula backed by scientific studies, such as Mike-berners lee.
Accomplishments that we're proud of
We are proud of successfully building Carbon Cache as a fully functional Chrome extension that securely connects to Google Drive and Gmail using OAuth and analyzes real user storage data to estimate digital carbon footprints. We developed a scientifically grounded carbon estimation model based on published lifecycle emission factors, allowing users to understand the environmental impact of their digital storage in a clear and actionable way. We also designed the system to be completely serverless, with all calculations performed locally in the browser to ensure privacy, scalability, and efficiency.
What we learned
Throughout the duration of this competition, we have gained a lot of knowledge related to coding and digital storage. We learned how to effectively connect to Google APIs, and using proper authentication to read metadata. Additionally, we are not the best at coding front-end, so this project enhanced our front-end skills. Beyond the technical skills obtained, we realized that have minimalistic and precise code is better and sometimes more optimal than messy code depending on the situation.
What's next for Carbon Cache
Currently, Carbon Cache only gathers carbon footprint and cleanup suggestions from Google drive, Gmail, and Google Photos. In the future, we plan to add more websites that store data. Beyond incremental features, we plan to add a more detailed insights page, and officially publish Carbon Cache to the chrome web store.
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