The ESG Perspective: Balancing Innovation (AI) with Sustainability

As we embark on a new year, the issue of climate change remains a major concern on the global agenda. With pressure mounting on companies to reduce their carbon footprint and make their environmental impact as small as possible, there is a growing recognition that we need to find innovative solutions to address this urgent challenge and one such technology that has the potential to both benefit and harm sustainability efforts is artificial intelligence.

As the world grapples with pressing environmental challenges, the role of artificial intelligence (AI) in promoting sustainability has become increasingly prominent. AI can be used in multitude of ways to address a range of environmental and sustainability issues, from enormous data centre efficiency to using earth imagery to locate plastic waste – and much more in between. However, creating sustainable AI is an area that companies need to look at as AI use exponentially grows.

CEOs across industries are leading their businesses to prioritize artificial intelligence. But as we proceed down this revolutionary route, one crucial query comes to mind: At what environmental cost does AI innovation come?

It is undeniable that AI can spur innovation and progress. However, there's growing concern about how creating and using AI may affect the environment. It takes a lot of computational power and energy to train AI models. For example, it is predicted that the carbon emissions from training a model such as GPT-3 equals the lifetime carbon emissions of five average cars. This startling fact raises the question:

Is the environmental cost of AI being overlooked in the rush for digital transformation?

Sustainable AI is based on two main principles. First and foremost, we need to make sure AI is sustainable and does not harm the environment. The second is to employ AI as a tool to lessen the detrimental impacts of different industries on the environment and to support sustainable growth. We can pave the path for a more sustainable and ecologically aware future by concentrating on both facets of sustainable AI.

The impact of ESG scores on investment decisions, customer perceptions, and regulatory responses is on the rise. Adhering to sustainable AI practices has the potential to raise your company's ESG scores and establish it as a pioneer in ethical innovation. As we witness the AI revolution, the decisions made today will define the trajectory of our technological and environmental future. For example, CO2 is a byproduct of developing any AI system. Indeed, it's estimated that for every 20 to 50 questions it receives, ChatGPT "drinks" 500ml of water, which is utilized for cooling. When organizing an AI project, carbon emissions must be taken into account, tracked, and offset. Any project should be integrated into a larger sustainability strategy to make sure its goals are in line with Net Zero commitments.

Figure: CO2-emissions of AI models for different tasks such as automatic translation or text summarisation (Source: Huggingface)

Hence, the journey towards sustainable AI involves several critical considerations:

·       Energy-Efficient Hardware: Developments in AI-specific chips, such TPUs, have the potential to drastically lower energy usage.

              ·       Green Data Centers: Investing in renewable energy for data centers is a step forward.

 ·       Algorithmic Efficiency: Creating AI models that require fewer resources could have an environmental benefit.

                ·      Carbon Offsetting and Credits: Although it's not a long-term fix, carbon offsetting can assist in balancing the carbon footprint of your business.

With proper implementation and execution, sustainable AI can reduce the adverse environmental impacts of traditional AI and ML model training and optimization techniques without compromising the accuracy of its predictions and outputs. The terms "green AI" and "sustainable AI" are often used interchangeably to refer to initiatives aimed at mitigating these negative impacts and guaranteeing that the future of artificial intelligence has more advantages than disadvantages.

Putting it all together, sustainable AI is an important aspect in the fight against climate change and to reduce CO2 emissions. While digitalization is often seen as a solution to reduce the carbon footprint, it is crucial to consider the energy consumption and CO2 emissions associated with large-scale systems and IT infrastructures. Green IT and green coding are approaches that can help to reduce the environmental impact of software development. It is often the small measures that make the difference.

 

In conclusion, adopting sustainable AI not only drives us toward a more eco-friendly and efficient future but also highlights the pivotal role of EHS consultancy in advancing sustainable lifestyles. By seamlessly incorporating renewable energy, biodiversity conservation, carbon footprint reduction, climate change mitigation, and ecosystem services into the core of the environmental, health, and safety services we offer, we not only protect the well-being of our planet but also empower businesses to flourish in a responsible and eco-conscious manner. It is through this unwavering commitment to sustainability that we collectively pave the way for a brighter and more sustainable tomorrow.