# More Sustainability in Industry through Industrial Internet of Things?
## 5 Discussion  
Transformations in emerging countries such as China play an important role for sustainable development, considering the potential global impacts of these countries. This development must be evaluated for all three dimensions of sustainability. For the social dimension, [PERSON] et al. (2017) provide first insights [45]. For the environmental dimension, three possible starting points for a more sustainable industrial production through digitalization were identified. Our case study supports the idea of potential benefits in these three areas: transparency, resource efficiency and sustainable energy. The majority of participating companies have a sustainability strategy in place and operate an environmental management system. Almost all participants expect this strategy to be influenced by digitalization. On the one hand, this result suggests a willingness to improve transparency for environmental matters, while, on the other hand, participants seem to perceive digitalization and sustainability not as isolated but interconnected developments. This is noteworthy, since the results of a similar case study conducted in Germany showed a comparable share of participants whose companies have implemented a sustainability strategy (57%, N = 70) but a much smaller share of participants believes that industrial digitalization will have an impact on the sustainability strategy of their respective company (53%, N = 39) [11]. The lack of actual information is one barrier for an effective environmental management. Results of our survey indicate that often relevant people are not provided with environment-related information, as the lack of awareness regarding energy consumption by employees who plan the production processes illustrates. The IIoT-enabled availability of live data on environmental indicators such as energy consumption could make it easier for all employees to access such information and thus effectively improve the environmental management of companies. The supply chain is an important part of an integrative sustainability management, since shifting the environmental burden to suppliers should be avoided. However, our results show that participants are still hesitant regarding the digital inclusion of suppliers. Since this integration is a crucial factor for full transparency, barriers such as security concerns must be identified and solved to exploit the sustainability potentials. The expectations regarding a more resource-efficient production through digital technologies are high among Chinese participants. They correspond with expectations of other experts in the industrialized world, for example in Germany [45], albeit Chinese participants seem to be particularly optimistic. Improving resource efficiency in one production step does not necessarily lead to a more sustainable production. Further research has to be carried out to identify the framework conditions that assure resource efficiency along the whole supply chain and avoid rebound effects. Additionally, these potentials should be quantified thoroughly. When interpreting the results of our survey, several facts have to be considered. According to the Renewable Energy Statistics provided by IRENA, China was generating almost a quarter of all global renewable energy in 2015--more than any other country or continent (see [46]). On the other hand, China's energy consumption is so huge that the share of renewable energy is still relatively small:  
Figure 3: Hours that machines are in stand-by mode per day. around 8.5% [44]. Around 81% of the Chinese renewable energy generated stems from hydropower [46], which also means that decentralized renewable energy systems are currently playing a less prominent role. Our survey results emphasize that conclusion: companies which have already installed their own facilities for renewable energy generation, or have plans to do so, are still the rare exception.