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By Jack Graham [[link removed]] | Deputy Editor, Funded Projects

Knotty problems

For journalists like me, the annual U.N. COP climate summits are a treasure trove of exciting people to interview.

Sure enough, at COP29 in Azerbaijan’s capital Baku the other day I sat down with Andrew Steer [[link removed]] who leads the $10 billion Bezos Earth Fund.

Steer has been a leading voice in the climate world for decades, and now runs the fund set up by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos - which aims to find and scale climate solutions.

I wanted to find out more about their upcoming work on AI, following a $100 million call for proposals for projects that would use artificial intelligence tools.

"Our interest is in finding really knotty problems that smart people are trying to solve but they simply don't have the capacity," Steer explained.

Andrew Steer speaks at 'The Brave and the Brilliant' TED Talk in Vancouver, Canada. April 16, 2024. Jason Redmond/TED/Handout via Thomson Reuters Foundation

He revealed the fund has had 1,500 applications for funding which it is sifting through. In this round of funding, it is focusing on alternative proteins, smart electricity grids, and biodiversity tracking.

AI tools are developing at a pace, and Steer pointed to their ability to identify invasive species - such as the Burmese python which has caused havoc in Florida.

"So they put all kinds of traps down, but most of those traps actually catch other animals, they don't catch the pythons," Steer said.

"AI can, through sight recognition and even by scratching a little bit of the scales, trigger a trap just for that."

AI's footprint

The potential use cases of AI in climate and nature are fairly clear. The world cannot sustain our levels of meat-eating, electricity is surging, and biodiversity needs monitoring.

But what about the water and energy needed to power AI itself, from the data crunching of major tech firms like Amazon to the generative AI tools and chatbots at people’s fingertips?

From Ireland to Mexico, Context has reported on data centres [[link removed]] which are causing huge strain for local communities.

Drone shot of one of Microsoft's data centres located in the municipality of Colón, in Querétaro, México, June 17, 2024. Thomson Reuters Foundation/Miguel Tovar

I put this to Steer, who said there are two schools of thought: optimists who believe technology will solve many of these problems, and the other view that says it is going to cause overwhelming energy demand.

"The answer is we can't control the growth of AI, obviously," he said. "We just need to make sure that we monitor that it doesn't do more harm to the environment than it does good."

See you next week,

Jack

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