The Climate Reality Project is distributing an online quiz to determine your climate knowledge ahead of Earth Day.
The 60 second quiz can be accessed here.
My daughter told me the other day that she tried out Chat GPT to update her resume and she was impressed by what it spewed out for her to work with. A few months ago, one of the nonprofits I volunteer for asked that I use AI to create content for their new shopping website — I can’t say that I was all that impressed, yet I am enjoying how google searches yield curated content for me on just about any topic. This morning I searched on AI and Climate change and found some interesting information. While there are key areas in which AI is seen to offer promise in addressing the crisis, it doesn’t come without a crisis of its own, namely the amount of energy it relies on.
Here are some highlights …
The World Economic Forum spotlights the “transformational power” of AI in the battle against climate change. Some of the ways it can be employed are:
- Predict weather, track icebergs and identify pollution
- Improve agriculture and reduce its environmental impact
- Map deforestation
- Assist with waste management
- Clear polluting plastics from the ocean
- Predict climate disasters
- Help plan low-emission transportation routes.
The initiative, which launched in January 2024, is a partnership between Rio's city hall and start-up Morfo, and aims to grow seeds in hard-to-reach areas.
A single drone can disperse 180 seed capsules per minute, which is 100 times faster than using human hands for traditional reforestation, according to the local government.
One of the criticisms of AI is that it uses too much energy. From The Hill this morning AI policy can’t ignore climate change: We need net zero AI emissions:
While there may be some efficiency gains because of AI, we can anticipate a net increase in electricity demand, particularly as the entertainment industry and others develop new and creative uses for AI. This AI-driven increase will likely begin within the next several years, well before the power network has had the time to convert from the current fossil fuel-based system to a low-emissions renewables-dominated one.
Consequently, expect more emissions from the power sector in the near term. Over the longer term, it will also reduce the available carbon budget, which is the amount of future emissions that can be accommodated within internationally agreed temperature targets.
The author suggests that “AI needs to be turned on itself to find mechanisms that result in net zero emissions and even make net negative emissions possible. This should include the development of innovative emissions reduction measures, as well as more ways to increase zero-carbon electricity production with a focus on achievable solutions.”
According to Chat GPT, a recent study by the University of Massachusetts Amherst found that training a single generative AI model can consume as much as 284,000 liters of water, which is equivalent to the amount of water an average person would consume over the course of 27 years.
Over at Friends of the Earth, meanwhile, the case against AI and climate change is quite forceful in Report: Artificial Intelligence A Threat to Climate Change, Energy Usage and Disinformation:
- AI systems require an enormous amount of energy and water, and consumption is expanding quickly. Estimates suggest a doubling in 5-10 years.
- Generative AI has the potential to turbocharge climate disinformation, including climate change-related deepfakes, ahead of a historic election year where climate policy will be central to the debate.
- The current AI policy landscape reveals a concerning lack of regulation on the federal level, with minor progress made at the state level, relying on voluntary, opaque and unenforceable pledges to pause development, or provide safety with its products.
“The skyrocketing use of electricity and water, combined with its ability to rapidly spread disinformation, makes AI one of the greatest emerging climate threat-multipliers, said Charlie Cray, Senior Strategist at Greenpeace USA, “Governments and companies must stop pretending that increasing equipment efficiencies and directing AI tools towards weather disaster responses are enough to mitigate AI’s contribution to the climate emergency.”
Letters were submitted to President Biden calling for:
- Transparency: Companies must publicly report on energy usage and emissions produced, assess any environmental justice concerns related to developing AI technology and disclose how their AI models produce information in a way that prioritizes climate science.
- Safety: Companies must be able to publicly demonstrate their products are safe for users and the environment. In addition, governments should develop standards on AI safety reporting and invest in research that maps the risks AI poses to the spread of climate disinformation.
- Accountability: Governments should enforce rules on investigating and mitigating the climate impacts of AI with clear, strong penalties for noncompliance. Companies and their executives must be held accountable for any harms that occur as a result of their products.
UN climate chief presses for faster action, says humans have 2 years left ‘to save the world’
OXFORD, England (AP) — Humanity has only two years left “to save the world” by making dramatic changes in the way it spews heat-trapping emissions and it has even less time to act to get the finances behind such a massive shift, the head of the United Nations climate agency said.
With governments of the world facing a 2025 deadline for new and stronger plans to curb carbon pollution, nearly half of the world’s populations voting in elections this year, and crucial global finance meetings later this month in Washington, United Nations executive climate secretary Simon Stiell said Wednesday he knows his warning may sound melodramatic. But he said action over the next two years is “essential.”
“We still have a chance to make greenhouse gas emissions tumble, with a new generation of national climate plans. But we need these stronger plans, now,” Stiell said in a speech at the Chatham House think tank in London. He suggested that climate action is not just for powerful people to address — in a not-so-veiled reference to the electoral calendar this year.
Kitchen Table Kibitzing is a community series for those who wish to share a virtual kitchen table with other readers of Daily Kos who aren’t throwing pies at one another. Drop by to talk about music, your weather, your garden, or what you cooked for supper…. Newcomers may notice that many who post in this series already know one another to some degree, but we welcome guests at our kitchen table and hope to make some new friends as well.