AI for Sustainability: Tackling Climate Change and Environmental Issues

Brief

In an era marked by burgeoning technological advancements alongside the looming specter of climate change, artificial intelligence (AI) has emerged as a pivotal ally.

According to the World Health Organization, nearly 4 billion individuals presently reside in regions acutely susceptible to climate change impacts.

Projections suggest that by 2030-2050, these vulnerabilities could translate into approximately 250,000 additional deaths annually, attributed solely to factors like undernutrition, malaria, diarrhoea, and heat stress.

Harnessing the power of AI offers multifaceted solutions to combat climate change and environmental challenges.

Here are several key ways in which AI can contribute:

Icebergs are melting – AI knows where and how fast

AI has been trained to measure changes in icebergs 10,000 times faster than a human could do it.

This will help scientists understand how much meltwater icebergs release into the ocean – a process accelerating as climate change warms the atmosphere.

Mapping deforestation with AI

AI, satellite images and ecology expertise are also being used to map the impact of deforestation on the climate crisis.

Space Intelligence, a company based in Edinburgh, Scotland, says it is working in more than 30 countries and has mapped more than 1 million hectares of land from space using satellite data.

The company’s technology remotely measures metrics, such as deforestation rates and how much carbon is stored in a forest.

Using AI to recycle more waste

Another AI system is helping to tackle climate change by making waste management more efficient.

Waste is a big producer of methane and is responsible for 16% of global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, according to the United States Environmental Protection Agency.

One of a software startup based in London, United Kingdom, has developed an AI system that analyzes waste processing and recycling facilities to help them recover and recycle more waste material.

The company tracked 32 billion waste items across 67 waste categories in 2022, and says it identifies 86 tonnes of material on average that could be recovered but is being sent to landfill.

AI helps predict climate disasters

In São Paulo, Brazil, a company is using AI to predict where and when climate disasters will occur, and what type of climate disasters they will be.

The aim is to help businesses and governments better prepare for climate change and the growing challenges for communities that come with it.

The company works in industries including insurance, energy, logistics and sport, where its analysis of disaster conditions and factors such as air quality can inform decisions on whether to delay or suspend events.

A wish list of AI climate tools

Google DeepMind, Google’s AI research laboratory, says it is applying AI to help fight climate change in a number of areas.

This includes building a complete wish list of datasets that would advance global AI solutions for climate change.

Google DeepMind is working on this with Climate Change AI, a non-profit organization set up by volunteers from academia and industry who see a key role for machine learning in combating climate change.

Other Google AI tools are focused on improving weather forecasting and increasing the value of wind energy by better predicting the output from a wind farm.

End Note

In the future, generative AI could be used in contexts such as drug design, architecture and engineering, the Forum says.

AI can also be used to improve agriculture and reduce its environmental impact by processing data from sensors placed on crops.

Stay tuned for more such insightful editions ahead!