Page 6 - Frontier technologies to protect the environment and tackle climate change - Executive Summary

Frontier technologies to protect the environment and tackle climate change

Frontier technology highlights

Reducing air pollution, hydrological risk or managing e-waste using AI

Biodiversity and conservation, ocean help, water security, smart cities, clean air and disaster risk
are just some of the areas in which AI systems can address climate change. They can perform
tasks in areas such as automated detection and monitoring, risk assessment and predictive
analysis – improving the accuracy of climate change models, forecasting scenarios, optimizing
energy and materials use, consumer awareness and behaviour ‘nudging’ towards sustainability
– for example by helping calculate individual carbon footprints, as well as quality control of data.
AI even has the potential to predict cloud formation; by resolving more complicated, smaller-
scale atmospheric processes, such as the ones involved in convective cloud formation, it can
help reduce this single biggest source of uncertainty in global climate models.

In cities, AI can help with route and traffic optimization, cutting waiting times, enabling better
traffic flows, facilitating autonomous and ride-sharing services (in effect cutting the number of
vehicles on roads and helping increase driver compliance with environmental regulations).

The report explores the case study of Moscow, where AI powered intelligent traffic control
systems help monitor traffic through an extensive network of smart traffic lights, vehicle sensors
and CCTV, controlling smart intersections and providing commuters with essential real-time
information on traffic, weather and pollution conditions.

Further case studies illustrate the use of AI in quantum computing, potentially offering AI at
unprecedented computing speeds. In Japan, AI is already helping to cut natural disaster risk,
with a prototype tsunami alert including an automatically launched drone sending alerts using
facial recognition software to identify victims. The UNESCO G-WADI (Water and Development
Information for Arid Lands – a Global Network) Geoserver application helps manage and
mitigate hydrological risk using artificial neural networks to estimate real-time precipitation
worldwide, informing emergency planning and flood management, preparing flood or drought
information bulletins, and tracking storms.

AI can also be applied to the waste sector, with innovations currently in operation across the
globe including smart recycling using robotic waste sorters, intelligent trash cans using AI and
IoT-enabled sensors to measure their contents and relay information to waste centres, or even
sort the waste and decide what to do with it. It is clear that AI systems can help in many areas,
although the report sounds a note of caution as there are still certain limitations that must be
addressed in terms of carbon footprint and efficiency in order for AI reach its full potential.

Using IoT for smart energy infrastructure management to help reduce carbon dioxide and
greenhouse gas emissions

Thanks to increasingly cost-effective IoT-enabled devices and systems, a multitude of new
opportunities for gathering vital data have opened up, with the potential to be used in
developed and developing countries alike.

From remote rural areas to the heart of busy cities, IoT sensors busily gather scientific data
to help mitigate climate change and promote energy efficiency. The report explores some
of the uses of IoT in the urban environment of Dubai, which uses a city-wide IoT network and
some 200 000 smart meters to help save water and energy. Its Green Dubai initiative helps
cut electricity and water usage, generate clean solar energy and encourage electric vehicle

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