How can the tech industry strike a balance between innovation and environmental responsibility?

A recent article from Forbes "Green Intelligence: Why Data and AI Must Become More Sustainable," delves into the critical need for sustainability in the realms of data and artificial intelligence. As the world increasingly relies on data-driven technologies to drive innovation and solve complex problems, there is a growing concern about the environmental impact of these technologies.

Key points from the article suggest that Data Centres and AI computations require significant energy contributing to carbon emissions therefore affecting the environment, the production and disposal of hardware components for data storage and AI systems further strain natural resources, and companies developing and deploying AI and data solutions have a responsibility to prioritise sustainability in their operations.

So how can the tech industry strike a balance between innovation and environmental responsibility and what role should policymakers play in promoting sustainability within the industry?

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  • One of the key challenges is that cloud compute resources aren't necessarily geo-located (although external factors, such as data sovereignty requirements in healthcare that forbid patient information being accessed/ stored outside the country where it was collected, can mitigate this in practice) so national policies alone may not be enough to ensure incentivise (e.g. green tax credits) or enforce (legislating for the mandatory procurement of sustainable options) . Therefore policymakers are needed to advocate for alignment in approach between different countries.

  • That’s a really good point, Peter. There are also some great examples of how AI can be used to improve sustainability itself but I wonder if there are any examples of emerging technologies that can mitigate the environmental impact of the AI in the first place, in addition to the policy levers you mentioned.

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  • That’s a really good point, Peter. There are also some great examples of how AI can be used to improve sustainability itself but I wonder if there are any examples of emerging technologies that can mitigate the environmental impact of the AI in the first place, in addition to the policy levers you mentioned.

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