AI can help fight climate change, but it has costs
AI is being used to tackle climate change, from giving early weather warnings to helping renewable energy fit into the power grid.
But there's a catch: Martin Krause from the UN Environment Programme pointed out that running powerful AI systems takes a lot of energy and water, especially in data centers.
As he put it at the AI Impact Summit in New Delhi, these technologies "AI is already helping to predict early weather warnings, such as floods and storms, with much greater accuracy, and if deployed at scale, it could protect hundreds of millions of people," but we also need to watch out for their environmental downsides.
UN says we need to use renewable energy for AI
This concern isn't just talk—a recent UN resolution (passed in December 2025) urges countries to make sure AI development goes hand-in-hand with protecting the planet.
The big idea? Use more renewable energy for AI operations so we get the benefits without adding extra strain on natural resources.