Global | Artificial intelligence: also environmentally disruptive

Summary

AI disruption extends to the realm of climate change, offering what should be promising solutions, but also adding pressure on natural resources.

Key points

• Key points:
• On the positive side, AI facilitates the optimization of greenhouse gas emissions monitoring and enhances carbon capture processes through both natural and technological solutions.
• In addition to supporting climate mitigation and adaptation policies, AI also accelerates the energy transition by identifying new materials for clean technologies and enhancing energy storage capabilities.
• Data processing centers, which are central to AI development, consumed between 1% and 1.3% of global electricity in 2022, surpassing the 0.9% of electricity demand in the Spanish economy.
• The challenge goes beyond energy; data centers also consume large amounts of water, both to cool servers (direct footprint) and to meet their electricity requirements (indirect footprint). This showcases the importance of internalizing AI's negative externalities on natural resources to ensure it also ultimately becomes a "positive" environmental disruption.

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