As society demands more digital, then the physical impact is even greater. For instance, a higher need for connectivity means sending more satellites into space and installing more cables underground.

An increased need for digital technologies such as crypto and AI means more data centres, and, the demand for a flashy new device entails more manufacturing facilities and more supply chain infrastructure.

While the digital world transforms, it has also led to a greater energy demand, a higher clean water demand, and the desire for more land to build data centres – something, Peter Campbell, director of green software at digital transformation consultancy Kainos, does not believe there is enough awareness of.

To address this, he’s written a book Digital Sustainability: The Need for Greener Software which unearths the environmental costs of digitisation.

“A couple of years ago, Kainos started a corporate net zero programme and made very aggressive targets, but we weren’t really dealing with anything to do with sustainability for our customers and we felt there was a bit of a gap there,” Campbell tells TI.

“Our business is building software for our customers, and yet we’ve got no thoughts on sustainability and no voice or views on this subject , and we’re not helping our customers do this.”

So, 18 months ago, Kainos created Campbell’s role of director of green software to tackle a lack of awareness and to write a book on exactly how digital software is impacting the environment, and what IT professionals can do to address this.

“The numbers are kind of staggering whenever you understand the amount of e-waste we generate every year, and this is increasing,” he says.

“The bigger issue is in developed countries where we buy more electronic goods, we throw away more electronic goods, and we change them on a more regular cycle.”

Europe is the highest continent for e-waste, and the issue is only mounting. In our personal lives, drawers fill up with old tech that doesn’t see recycling centres, and even when it does, the amount that can be recycled is very little.

“We’ve got this rising curve of demand, and yet, we’re doing very little to recycle that back or even repair the devices that we can.”

Campbell admits that for businesses calculating the amount of energy and e-waste is complicated. “It’s difficult for businesses because most don’t own their own data centres, they don’t own infrastructure for a lot of their IT.”

Additionally, while businesses can track their in-office e-waste, most are unaware of how the data, cloud, AI, and other digital technologies have an environmental impact – and with the rising popularity of AI, this is only going to get worse.

The rise of GenAI

“For me, both crypto and GenAI are the poster child examples of IT substantially increasing both the carbon emissions and the wider environmental cost, particularly over the last five years,” says Campbell.

“There are a lot of academic studies that have tried to estimate this, but it’s hard at a macro level.”

According to the International Energy Agency, data centres and transmission networks each account for up to 1.5% of global consumption, and, the rise of AI is set to make this even higher.

According to the same study, simply training an AI model is estimated to use more power than 100 households in a year.

“GenAI’s just increasing as far as we can see, and the many billions that are being pumped into that by internet giants is a testament to that,” says Campbell. “Of course, it has so much potential, but the environmental cost is almost entirely, and intentionally, hidden from us.”

Gartner says that by 2025, without sustainable AI practices, AI will consume more energy than the human workforce. And, as Campbell details in his book, academic studies estimate that at the current rate of growth, AI could consume 83-134 TWh of electricity by 2027, the same as a small country.

On top of this, billions of litres of clean water are consumed per year by AI models. This is because the data centres that power LLMs guzzle energy and are running at a constant, meaning they are susceptible to overheating and malfunctioning. Clean water is needed to keep them running at safe temperatures.

But all this comes at a cost: it’s speculated that water withdrawal for AI could reach 4,200 billion litres to 6,600 billion litres in the next three years – half the water needed by the United Kingdom.

This, however, remains as estimations and speculations, and Campbell says that more transparency is needed to get a true understanding of the environmental impact so that suppliers and consumers can choose to use AI with the knowledge of these implications.

“Google, I think without a doubt, is the best path that all the others could follow,” says Campbell.

“It lists all of its data centres, and it says this specific data centre in Ireland uses this much carbon-free energy, versus this data centre in Israel, versus Singapore, versus Oregon, versus whatever,” he explains.

Then, if a software company chooses to deploy a particular AI job, for instance, to a country like Finland because it may involve lower water use, higher in renewable energy, and lower in waste compared to other data centres.

“Therefore, it’s not really a financial cost choice, it’s an environmental cost choice.”

Carbon accounting needs to account for more

Originally, Campbell explains that the book started with discussing carbon emissions, before realising that digital sustainability is broader than just carbon accounting.

“Carbon accounting gets most of the headlines because it is important to begin with, but it shouldn’t be an endpoint because sustainability is much wider than that,” says Campbell.

“As we all know, sustainability is also about biodiversity, it’s about deforestation, and it’s about the people who live in different areas.”

Carbon accounting relies on data explaining how much money a firm has paid another company for goods or services, and how many litres of fuel or kilograms of material a firm has bought to calculate how many emissions have been made.

What it doesn’t cover is other aspects such as water usage, the environmental impact on the local area, and the effect on biodiversity.

“Digital sustainability needs to speak to the wider sustainability agenda as well,” says Campbell. “So not decarbonisation of software, but getting people to ask their providers in their supply chain: What’s the water use from this? How does it impact the local environment around you and biodiversity? And even going deeper than that into mining questions.”

Is copper the new oil?

“There’s so much information there that could be provided that would help us understand the problem,” says Campbell.

Reducing digital footprint

Still, AI has potential to save productivity gains, and contribute to better efficiency.

“Whether it’s smart farming, monitoring water leakages from utility companies, or optimising energy usage. There are huge opportunities, but it’s a balance between value and cost, financial and environmental,” says Campbell. “

Ultimately, Campbell hopes the book will inspire people to improve their digital sustainability and encourage providers to become more transparent and allow their users to balance their digital carbon footprint.

For instance: “if everyone in the EU all kept our smartphones for one year extra, that is the equivalent of taking 2 million cars off the EU roads,” says Campbell. “That act in itself is probably the biggest single change we can make to reduce manufacturing of new devices and recycling devices as well.”

Then, it can be as simple as reducing the brightness of our screens, or not having three screens on at once if it’s not needed, reducing our storage and ‘dark data’, which Campbell says can make a significant difference.

“We can look at e-waste, that gets collected with the bins every couple of weeks. But if we start to think about compute ways and data waste and data mountains in the same sense as actual waste, that transforms the choices around computing and devices and our own personal behaviours.”

Four significant digital cost facts:

– Software has a larger environmental footprint than the aviation industry.

– It costs OpenAI $700k a year to run its services such as ChatGPT.

– ChatGPT “drinks” a 500ml bottle of water for a simple conversation of roughly 20-50 questions and answers.

– The IEA estimate that data centres in Ireland will make up for a third of the country’s national grid supply by 2026.

The post The hidden cost of AI and digital transformation appeared first on TechInformed.

The session was part of EarthFest 2024, a sustainability festival that brought together thought leaders and industry experts through interactive demonstrations, talks, and workshops.

As environmental sustainability becomes an increasingly pressing concern for industries worldwide, the Google session showcased how AI can play a crucial role in transforming how firms approach the journey towards achieving Net Zero.

Sectors like Real Estate and Conservation, typically bereft of digital innovation, are joining the technological revolution with AI.

Yet, as these industries navigate their digital transformation, they face challenges. Crafting sector-specific AI models, harmonising AI’s capabilities with sustainability objectives, and overcoming data scarcity are some hurdles to a greener future.

Anna Williams, geo-sustainability lead at Google EMEA, kickstarted the session with an optimistic statement: “A report by Google and the Boston Consulting Group shows that AI has the potential to help mitigate 5-10% of global greenhouse gas emissions by 2030.”

According to Williams, that’s the equivalent of the total annual emissions of the European Union.

Retrofitting real estate with AI

The real estate sector, responsible for 40% of those emissions, will likely face fundamental changes as the global economy decarbonises to meet climate goals.

Ranjeet Bhalerao, CEO and co-founder of MapMortar, a virtual modelling and simulation platform for decarbonisation retrofit planning, highlighted the scale of the problem.

“To meet those climate targets of 1.5°C, we need to decarbonise one New York City worth of buildings every single week for the next 30 years,” he says, which would cost $1.3 trillion.

According to Bhalerao, one of the primary challenges in Real Estate decarbonisation is the lack of comprehensive, structured data on existing buildings — which is crucial for accurate analysis.

“You’ll find data in PDFs and Excel sheets, and even old files sitting in the basement, which nobody ever looks at,” he said.

AI will enable users to structure data in a way that makes it usable, viewable, and understandable.

It can quickly extract valuable insights from various data sources, which would take humans a lot more time to complete.

“With a simple click of a button, AI can analyse complex graphs and charts to provide information such as your building’s EPC, areas where you might not comply with regulations, energy usage, and associated costs,” said Bhalerao.

Another issue the industry faces is that many Real Estate owners can’t easily find the energy performance data of their buildings, “It’s a huge problem in the industry,” according to Bhalerao.

However, MapMortar uses image recognition, powered by AI, to create building profiles based on predictive data. “We’re training our models to look at images and start giving information — like, that building is six stories tall, has so many windows, has this type of facade, built in this year — and therefore potentially has these characteristics.”

“When you have loads of complex parameters that affect a building, AI could start predicting how the building is going to perform or is performing today,” he continues, “We can use surrogates to predict the end performance and the carbon performance of the building.”

ConservAItion at London Zoo

From urban landscapes to the wild expanses of nature — AI is covering all bases.

The same technologies that can parse complex data to optimise building energy efficiency are also unlocking new frontiers in conservation.

In conservation, AI is proving instrumental in monitoring and protecting biodiversity. Robin Freeman, head of indicators and assessments at the Institute of Zoology within the Zoological Society of London, explained some of the ways that AI is transforming processes.

One of the biggest challenges in conservation is the sheer amount of data and the extensive manual labour required to process it.

Comprehensive analysis of biodiversity data from camera traps, audio recorders, and other sources “takes a long time to process manually,” says Freeman.

“A single person labelling those images might take two and a half months,” he continues. One example he gave was Mega Detector by Microsoft, which automates species detection in imagery and audio and reduces the time required to process data.

“Just using that to detect whether an animal is in the image, let alone what that species is, reduces the time it takes to process that data tenfold.” He continued, “We’re now deploying this at scale globally.”

The uncertainty in predictions of future biodiversity loss, which limits the ability to determine the best strategies to mitigate the loss, also poses a challenge.

“We looked at things like logistic regressions and convolutional neural networks to try to find papers relevant to our data. We were so excited last year when we could ask AI to find us the papers,” said Freeman.

He added, ” I think there’s an opportunity for us to use foundational models to look for text relevant to biodiversity change and build datasets that allow us to understand how biodiversity has changed.”

Freeman concluded that the interacting and complex drivers of biodiversity decline, such as climate change, habitat loss, and land use change, must all be addressed together to potentially see recovery.

“Only in cases where we did all of those things together do we see biodiversity begin to recover above the baseline. There’s a lot of uncertainty there. But the idea that we will only begin to see biodiversity recover when we do everything we can is quite fundamental.”

Navigating the AI revolution

The advent of foundational models ushers in a new era, according to Drew Purves, sustainability and biodiversity co-lead at Google DeepMind. He notes, “The net effect is that as a downstream user, you can do more than ever before with less data, less compute than ever before, and lower skills barriers.”

“If someone read one book on natural history, you wouldn’t necessarily think they’re an expert. But if they read and remembered 10 million books about natural history, you probably would.”

This democratisation of AI technology enables a broader range of stakeholders to engage in sustainability efforts, making complex environmental solutions more accessible and feasible.

Purves points to several AI democratisation applications from Google DeepMind that underscore the scale of its impact.

“For the first time in history, we can now take a DNA sequence, turn that into a sequence of amino acids, and then work out the protein’s shape. This has dramatic implications for environmental sustainability,” he said.

Another notable mention was Google DeepMind’s breakthrough in weather forecasting, which achieves unprecedented accuracy with minimal computational resources.

“Not only are those forecasts more accurate than all other previous forecasts,” he claimed, “but you can make these predictions on a laptop.”

As Purves puts it, the AI revolution is not just reshaping our tools and techniques but redefining the boundaries of what’s possible in our quest for a sustainable future.

These advancements’ implications extend far beyond scientific research and energy production; they represent a paradigm shift in how we approach environmental challenges. “And that sounds a bit too good to be true anyway, but that’s what technological revolutions do.”

The post From conservation to construction: sector-specific decarbonisation with AI appeared first on TechInformed.

However, its overall contribution to climate change could be significantly higher because plane emissions significantly impact the concentration of other atmospheric gases and pollutants. Some scientists estimate aviation could be responsible for as much as 4% of the global temperature rise since pre-industrial times alone.

Rather than being grounded by the negatives, the sector has turned to new technology, one of which is Firefly, to propel itself to a greener future.

Some people say they often do their best thinking on the toilet. But Firefly Green Fuels has found a way to make those most sacred moments on the porcelain throne even more productive — by turning poop into petrol.

It’s not quite a flight of fancy; the Bristol-based company plans to turn sewage sludge into sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) and, in doing so, reduce carbon emissions to over 90% lower than standard fossil jet fuel.

What is SAF?

According to the IATA, Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) refers to fuels used in aviation that are not derived from fossil fuels. These fuels are sometimes called sustainable alternative jet fuel, renewable jet fuel or bio-jet fuel.

Initially, the term ‘biofuels’ was used for fuels made from biological materials such as plants or animals. However, technological advancements make it possible to produce fuel from non-biological and alternative sources. As a result, the terminology has evolved to emphasise the sustainability aspect of these fuels.

For SAF to be considered sustainable, it must meet strict criteria, including reducing lifecycle carbon emissions, not competing with food production, avoiding deforestation, and ensuring its production is environmentally responsible.

Crude oil

The heart of Firefly’s project is a process known as hydrothermal liquefaction. Think of it as a pressure cooker for excrement.

Simon Black, head of circular economy at Anglian Water (which will supply the sewage, or ‘biosolids feedstock’), explains that the journey begins with wastewater from households and various businesses. “It then goes through the collection network, miles and miles of pipework and pumping stations, to bring it to water recycling centres.

“They then separate the solids from the water to effectively clean the water and put it back into the environment.” The separated solids, rich in organic matter, will eventually be converted into fuel.

The separated solids undergo anaerobic digestion, a biological process in large tanks maintained at around 37°C.

Unlike chemical processes, this stage relies on the activity of microbes to break down the organic matter.

The result of this digestion is the production of biogas, which can be harvested for energy, and a by-product known as bio-sludge or biosolids. This material, comparable to manure, has traditionally been used as a fertiliser in agriculture.

Firefly’s innovative approach utilises hydrothermal liquefaction to emulate the natural geological processes that produce crude oil but at a much faster rate.

Applying high temperature and pressure converts the bio-sludge into bio-crude oil, transforming the solid waste into a liquid form that can then be refined into SAF.

Why sewage sludge?

Black explains that this process’s ability to guarantee the consistency of the sludge is crucial for any subsequent conversion processes, like turning the sludge into SAF.

“The benefit of using sewage sludge is that it has been through a very advanced form of anaerobic digestion and leaves the final material very consistent because it’s so highly treated, unlike livestock waste,” he says.

One of the main problems with producing SAF using conventional feedstocks, such as cooking oil and animal fats, is that they are costly and limited in availability.

While plant by-products can also be an alternative, the excessive use of agricultural land and forests to obtain large amounts of biomass can negatively impact ecosystems and biodiversity.

Paul Hilditch, co-founder of Firefly, explains that Firefly’s SAF technique is more affordable and scalable: “There’s enough biosolids in the UK to produce more than 200,000 tonnes of SAF. That’s enough to satisfy about half of the mandated SAF demand in 2030.

“We need the other routes to SAF, too,” Hilditch adds. “However, this new route has the potential to move the needle and make a significant contribution to UK SAF production. And not just the UK. Anywhere in the world where there are people, there is poo.”

According to Hilditch, scientists estimate the average human produces 30kg of dry-weight waste per year, which could produce over 14 billion litres of SAF.

Another by-product of this process is Biochar, a charcoal-like substance that can be used for carbon sequestration and could be used in construction or agriculture.

Firefly’s venture facilitates a circular economy where waste is not simply discarded but becomes a valuable resource. They say this model promotes efficient resource use, minimises waste, and stimulates economic growth by creating new industries and job opportunities related to SAF production.

By converting sewage sludge, a by-product of human activity that poses a disposal challenge, into clean fuel, they claim to address aviation’s carbon emissions and contribute to a broader sustainability agenda.

Air support

The first facility, set to break ground at the Harwich (Essex), UK site, will use existing infrastructure previously used for traditional crude oil and gas refining, saving production time, costs, and emissions.

It is poised to produce 100,000 tonnes of sustainable fuel per year. It’s backed by significant investments from key industry players, including Wizz Air, which recently committed to fuelling 10% of its flights with sustainable fuel by 2030.

Yvonne Moynihan, corporate & ESG officer at Wizz Air, described the partnership with Firefly as “a marriage of low costs.” This refers to how Firefly’s SAF, “the cheapest and most abundant feedstock,” is a perfect match for an airline focused on low costs and fares.

The Hungarian airline has ordered up to 525,000 tonnes of Firefly’s fuel over the next 15 years, potentially worth hundreds of millions of pounds.

Other partners include Petrofac, which will construct the SAF production facility; Haltermann Carless, which owns the site in Essex; Chevron Lummus Global, which will license its hydro-processing technology to Firefly; and Anglian Water.

Becoming bog-standard

Indeed, aviation is a notoriously tricky sector to address concerning carbon emissions, so Firefly’s innovative approach couldn’t come at a better time.

In 2022, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), a UN agency overseeing civil aviation worldwide, set the target of achieving net-zero CO2 emissions from international aviation by 2050.

This ambitious goal underscores the urgent need for innovation and investment, estimated at up to $5 trillion in clean aircraft and fuels.

The International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT) Aviation Vision 2050 report outlines the technologies and policies essential for reaching net zero within that timeframe.

It highlights sustainable aviation fuels (SAF), zero-emission planes (ZEPs) powered by hydrogen or electricity, and efficiency measures as critical levers.

Europe is leading the charge with legally binding SAF requirements, setting a precedent for 2% global SAF uptake by 2030.

Turbulence ahead

However, electric aircraft development has encountered obstacles, and Airbus’s decision to “start small” with its deployment of hydrogen-powered aircraft signals a recalibration of expectations.

Wizz Air, named Europe’s most sustainable airline, has pivoted its efforts from hydrogen power to SAF: “We see things progressing very slowly [with hydrogen] — there’s a lot of investment in infrastructure and regulatory framework to be put in place. So, we’ve really shifted our focus to sustainable aviation fuel as the future,” said Moynihan.

The post-COVID rebound in traffic, forecasted to exceed 2019 levels in the first quarter of 2024, adds another layer of complexity to reducing the industry’s carbon footprint.

Meanwhile, the EU Emissions Trading System (ETS) stands as a lone but critical mechanism for carbon pricing, covering a significant portion of passenger aviation CO2 emissions and supporting SAF deployment.

Wizz Air has noted that more needs to be done for them to reach their targets: “We call on policymakers to address barriers to SAF deployment at scale by incentivising production, providing price support, and embracing additional sustainable feedstocks for biofuel production,” said Moynihan.

In this context, Firefly’s initiative represents a beacon of hope and innovation.

By turning sewage sludge into SAF, Firefly contributes to the diversification of sustainable fuel sources and displays the creative thinking needed to overcome aviation’s environmental challenges.

The post Turning sewage into fuel: Firefly and Wizz Air to glide into net zero appeared first on TechInformed.

From the integration of sustainability in tech innovation to the rapid growth in climate tech funding, the narrative is straightforward — sustainability will become the cornerstone of future developments across industries as both a strategic imperative and a catalyst for unparalleled innovation.

1: Embracing sustainability in tech infrastructure

“Sustainability has previously been identified as a top three driver of innovation and primary consideration in the IT procurement process. Next year, we will see it have a much greater impact on which technologies IT teams pilot, invest in, procure and scale — particularly as regulations evolve, newly develop and tighten.

“For example, as of 1 January 2024, 50% of the electricity consumed by German data centres must be covered by electricity from renewable sources. From 2027, the requirement will be 100%.

“On their path to net zero and nature-positive operations, enterprises will increasingly look to leverage new technologies like Private 5G networks, used by global enterprises such as LyondellBasell and Schneider Electric, to drive critical smart factory applications that contribute to ESG initiatives — from carbon mitigation to circular economy of infrastructure hardware. We will also see greater pressure on IT suppliers to help industries achieve their sustainable development goals and KPIs.”

Vicky Bullivant, SVP Sustainability & HSE, NTT

“To curtail costs and emissions, companies will primarily concentrate on adopting more efficient infrastructure and sustainable energy sources. However, this may not suffice, as the relentless tide of innovation, driven by the demands of AI for capacity, speed, and power, cannot be restrained.

“In the upcoming year, companies will start recognising that ostensibly similar software platforms showcase significantly diverse carbon footprints. This awareness will spark a new wave of modernisation for inefficient software stacks that are currently deemed modern. Nevertheless, there is a silver lining: adopting a more efficient software platform will result in enhanced speed, cost-effectiveness, and environmental friendliness.

“With the ESRS (Emissions and Energy Reporting System) taking effect in 2024, companies operating in the EU are mandated to disclose their annual emissions. This regulation is poised to compel certain companies to establish more ambitious environmental and sustainability objectives, while others will face increased pressure to attain existing goals. However, clinging to legacy systems will render meeting these expectations nearly impossible.”

“Numerous organisations have opted to retire their data centres in favour of transitioning to the cloud as a strategy to reduce emissions. Yet, with major cloud providers now reporting emissions from individual account usage, companies must pivot their focus toward adopting more efficient software technologies that demand fewer hardware resources.”

Behrad Babaee, Technology Evangelist at Aerospike

“Sustainability is still a top priority in manufacturing, both in organisations’ processes and the products they are manufacturing. Sectors like aerospace, automotive, and energy have legislative goals to reach, such as getting to Net Zero by 2050, so much of their product development is around de-carbonising and incorporating ultra-efficient technologies.

“Our own study of 450 manufacturing executives shows that sustainability is a key driver in innovation and a key reason for manufacturers to develop new products. Digital manufacturing has an important part to play as it enables localised production and results in less waste, as outlined above.”

Bjoern Klaas, VP and MD of Protolabs Europe

2: Corporate Responsibility and Environmental Transparency

“In 2024, companies will continue to prioritise environmentally conscious practices. With the growing urgency to address climate change and avoid greenwashing accusations, organisations will likely maintain their commitment to sustainability in all aspects of their operations. This includes incorporating eco-friendly initiatives into their global mobility strategies.

“One key area where this will be evident is in relocation processes. Companies will increasingly offer carbon-neutral relocation packages, as well as promote green transportation options for expatriates. This shift supports corporate sustainability goals and meets the rising demand for environmentally responsible practices from employees and customers.

“Organisations will be keen to demonstrate a genuine commitment to sustainability, steering clear of greenwashing accusations and contributing positively to a more eco-friendly global mobility landscape.”

Zain Ali ,CEO at Centuro Global

“2024 will see consumers continue to vote with their wallets when it comes to ethical practices. But contrary to the sustainability consumer trends of a decade ago, these will be harder to mitigate with superficial marketing efforts because the critics are not just the customers anymore. They are the ones who design, make, market and sell the products as well.

“This could mark the beginning of the end for greenwashing practices. 2024’s cohorts of designers, creators and makers are going to have been trained in critical approaches to their disciplines, including Do No Harm, decolonial approaches, and sustainable design. They will have a more human, environmental, and ethical approach to the world, meaning that the products and services that are being released have responsibility at their core.

“As we step into a new year of climate emergency, renewable energy technologies will be hitting new heights of popularity with European governments- especially in the shadow of the current conflict and profiteering energy landscape.”

“What’s encouraging is that renewable energy will make up more than one-third of the world’s supply of power for the first time in 2024, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA) Electricity Market Report, so we are heading in the right direction.

“There, the pressure will be high to build relevant infrastructure to make these available to consumers, and governments will face immense pushback from companies whose business this endangers. As has been the case for decades — political will rather than technological capability will be the deciding factor.”

Dr Pardis Shafafi, anthropologist and global responsible business lead at Designit

3: The investment boom in climate tech and its societal impact

“In 2024, we will see even more investment pouring into Climate Tech solutions, particularly with lots of progress to be expected in renewables, carbon capture, sustainable agriculture, and circular economy models. We will also witness bigger shifts in climate reporting with new global standards. I believe the most influential technologies for sustainability and innovation will revolve around advanced energy storage, green hydrogen, sustainable food production, circular economy innovations, sustainable transport (e-mobility), and tech around climate resilience.

“The climate crisis is a global challenge already affecting all of us. Having a more diverse and inclusive workforce is part of the solution. Therefore, we increasingly need different perspectives and expertise to try and solve the problems that we are facing. I believe we will see a drive for more DEI initiatives to ensure we have a broad perspective when tackling climate challenges. Getting to good solutions often means embracing chaos and risk — something more traditional industries particularly struggle with.

Gabi Matic, co-founder and director at Metta

4: Government and policy driving change

“Government policy and investment will work more closely with the tech sector to help British entrepreneurs deliver initiatives to solve society’s most urgent dilemmas. 2024 will be the year that real innovation is unleashed in green tech. I’m not just talking about wind turbines and electric vehicles; I’m referring to a surge in digital platforms to tackle biodiversity and climate change. Underpinning this is a need for a change in attitude to investing early and for the long-term in innovative businesses, as is done in the US.”

Philip Letts, chair of LettsGroup

Climate change will continue to be a significant issue. Although governments are backtracking on commitments and giving businesses’ permission’ to slow down their initiatives, forward-thinking business leaders will see the benefits of continuing these initiatives to employees and consumers.

Jim Stevenson, CEO of Bletchley Group

The post 2024 Informed: The green revolution appeared first on TechInformed.

The law, approved on Monday and signed by governor Gavin Newsom, requires companies with more than $1 billion in annual revenue to report their greenhouse gas emissions.

The governor hailed the new law as a step towards helping the environment: “This important policy, once again, demonstrates California’s continued leadership with bold responses to the climate crisis.”

Addressing concerns about the economic implications on firms, he explained: “The implementation deadlines in this bill are likely infeasible,” adding that he is “concerned about the overall financial impact of this bill on businesses”.

California hosts a number of multibillion-dollar companies, including big tech firms such as Alphabet, Meta, Intel, and HP, which all pull in more than $50 billion a year.

The US state recently passed a similar law requiring companies with more than half a billion dollars in annual revenue to report their climate-related financial risks, which Newsom also voiced concerns about with the cost to businesses.

The California Air Resources Board will need to put a system in place for reporting emissions by January 1, 2025, under the legislation.

Senator Elizabeth Warren praised the new law, saying that it would help prevent “greenwashing”, stopping firms from over-exaggerating their actions on the environment in their marketing and that it would help investors understand different companies’ vulnerabilities.

The requirement will likely necessitate significant investments into carbon tracking technology so that firms can accurately report their emissions, something that technologies such as blockchain, artificial intelligence, and digital twins powered by IoT devices all claim to aid in – as reported in TI’s Green Enterprise Technologies Special Report.

The post California to force big tech like Meta and Apple to disclose carbon emissions appeared first on TechInformed.

The funding, first reported by Reuters, comes as governments around the globe have set targets to increase the number of carbon footprint reducing electric cars on the road, which require lithium-ion batteries to run.

Such capital-intensive operations, however, require billions in funding to get off the ground.

A factory Northvolt is building near the German coastal city of Heide, for instance, announced last year, is thought to require around 3-5 billion euros ($8.8bn) – and more in subsidies.

While the German factory is Northvolt’s third, other attempts have failed to get off the ground. A separate enterprise, Britishvolt, a battery venture based in Northumberland, collapsed earlier this year despite a wave of initial fan fare and government support, because it couldn’t raise the cash.

The beleaguered venture is still in the process of being rescued by Australian firm Recharge Industries, although a final payment, as reported by UK broadcaster ITV, has yet to be made.

Nonetheless, investor demand for companies set to benefit from the low carbon economy is picking up pace. In June, Northvolt’s financiers Vargas launched what it has dubbed ‘household energy’s answer to Tesla’ – Aira – which is set to offer air source heat pumps to residential customers.

This operation will also require a gigafactory, for heat pumps, which has been sourced in Wroclaw, Poland.

Besides asset manager giant BlackRock, Northvolt’s latest funding round was backed by Canada Pension Plan, Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System and Investment Management Corporation of Ontario.

Unfortunately for Britishvolt, it was unable to tap into pension funds because UK financial rules currently make it hard for investors to release funds from pension plans. However, a series of reforms are currently under way, with further actionable measures expected in this year’s Autumn statement.

The post Gigafactory giant raises $1.2bn for expansion in Europe and US appeared first on TechInformed.

The investment will see 12 green AI initiatives receive a share of £1 million to go towards decarbonising and boosting renewable energy.

The projects range from solar energy improvements that will use AI to improve its forecasting of when it will best produce energy for the grid, to the decarbonisation of dairy farming through the use of AI robots monitoring crop and soil health.

Alongside this, the government will invest £2.25 million into further AI innovations, with the aim of cutting emissions specifically in energy sectors.

“We are unquestionably world-leading when it comes to advanced AI and our track record for decarbonisation,” said the minister for energy efficiency and green finance, Lord Callanan. “This unique position means we must now push the boundaries in how this technology can enhance our rapidly-growing clean energy sector.”

“It’s projects like those announced today that will take us to the next step on our ambitious journey to becoming net zero, while boosting our energy security and creating a new wave of skilled jobs for the future,” Callanan added.

ClimateTech expert Laimonas Noreika, CEO of HeavyFinance commented: “AI is set to play a crucial role in tackling the climate change crisis, yet far too many firms lack the funding and support to fully embrace it.

“This new investment is a step in the right direction from the government and will play a crucial role in helping industries like energy, transport, and agriculture to make the most of the latest technology to decarbonise and go green.”

The government’s Digital Catapult agency, has also received up to £500,000 to launch the UK’s first Centre for Excellence on AI innovation for decarbonisation (ADViCE).

Last month, AI experts gathered at the UN’s AI for Good conference in Geneva to discuss how AI can solve issues such as sustainability.

The global summit, hosted by the UN’s International Telecommunication Union, called on governments and industry alike to take AI and use it to tackle global warming.

“AI development will not wait, the Sustainable Development Goals will not wait, and failure is not an option,” commented the ITU’s secretary-general, Doreen Bogdan-Martin in her keynote speech where she enforced that “we’re running out of time,” when it comes to climate change.

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The solution uses water, cement, and a form of carbon similar to soot which could store enough energy to power entire households.

The scientists say that this type of energy storage “provides a scalable material solution for energy storage to support the urgent transition from fossil fuels to renewable energies.”

Solar, wind, and tidal power collect energy at variable times and often the power they produce does not correlate with peak electricity demand. So, while the energy transition is seeing renewable energy sources surpass fossil fuel-based ones, MIT’s paper writes that finding a scalable energy storage solution is a necessity.

“There is a huge need for big energy storage,” said one professor working on the solution, Franz-Josef Ulm.  “That’s where our technology is promising because cement is ubiquitous.”

As usual batteries rely on materials such as lithium, which are in limited supply and have caused an increased demand for mines, the researchers are banking on the easily accessible, low-cost materials, that can be found “virtually anywhere”, such as cement, water, and carbon.

According to the paper, ‘carbon black’ is an extremely conductive element that can be added to wet cement blocks as they set, flowing through the gaps to create wire-like structures, and turning them into supercapacitors (alongside other processes such as soaking the material in an electrolyte) that are able to hold large electrical charges depending on the size of the concrete blocks.

With this, the researchers predict that the carbon-concrete supercapacitors could be used in the foundation of buildings to provide power, create self-charging roads for electric vehicles, and be able to store energy for wind turbines and tidal power stations.

Currently, the team have already created a set of button-sized supercapacitors which were able to power an LED light, and are now developing a 45-cubic-metre version to show how the technology can grow.

Their calculations suggest a block of this size could store around 10 kilowatt-hours of energy, which is the typical daily electricity usage of a household.

The researchers say that the plan is to commercialise the supercapacitors in the next few years.

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Almost eight years after the UN’s adoption of its 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, only 12% of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are on track, and poverty, hunger, pollution, biodiversity loss, and the global temperature remain on the rise, stated Bogdan-Martin.

For this reason: “Using AI to help put the 2030 agenda back on track is no longer an opportunity, it’s actually our responsibility,” she urged.

“AI development will not wait, the Sustainable Development Goals will not wait, and failure is not an option,” the secretary-general added.

Within the next seven years, AI risks “spiralling out of control” if left unchecked by industry, according to the ITU, which also warned of a growing digital divide that risks seeing only the wealthier benefit from new technologies.

“Unchecked AI advancements lead to social unrest, geopolitical instability, and economic disparity on a scale we’ve never seen before,” explained Bogdan-Martin.

“It’s essential that we address all the forms of bias – and that we develop ethical and rights-base systems that ensure transparency and accountability.”

If AI lives up to its promise, then the secretary-general claims that industry will look back and believe: “We did the right thing by enacting global governance frameworks allowing innovation to flourish while addressing all ethical, safety, and accountability considerations.”

In her keynote, Bogdan-Martin – who was the first woman in the ITU’s 157-year old history to be elected secretary-general – called upon leaders in AI: “Together, let’s make [AI] innovative, let’s make it safe, and let’s make it responsible for all.”

The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) is the United Nations specialised agency for telecommunications and information and communication technologies (ICTs), and has its headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland.

Speaking on the topic of sustainability at the TNW conference in Amsterdam last month, Google Deepminds COO Lila Ibrahim also challenged industry leaders: “It’s critical that we address the importance of diversity, equality, and inclusion now.

“It’s not something that we can wait for, and it’s not the responsibility of any one organisation. This is a requirement within all our organisations,” she said.

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There needs to be some type of storage system to capture energy for future use. One solution is to deploy lithium-ion batteries for renewable energy storage, but they require the use of mining and eventually degrade. Underground gravity energy storage (UGES) is a proposed solution to this problem.

Abandoned mines pockmark the world, vestiges of more prosperous days. They have no current use and in many cases are even dangerous.  But they also quite literally hold potential. Instead of sitting empty, they can serve as sites for giant, potential-energy-based storage systems.

Although underground gravity energy storage is still in the conceptual stage, researchers have fleshed out what it might look like in a 2022 publication. Each mine shaft could hold a large container of sand occupying 50% of the volume of the shaft. The other half of the mineshaft would be empty. The UGES system would include the mineshaft, motor, cable, and containers for the sand.

In times of excess energy production, such as during very sunny or windy weather, the motor-powered cable would hoist the sand container to a high point. Like a ball poised on the edge of a skyscraper, the higher the container sits, the more potential energy it will hold — in other words, the harder it will fall.

This controlled fall would power a turbine during times of peak energy demand or low energy generation, just as water powers a turbine in hydroelectric dams. This stage is called discharge and works on the concept of regenerative braking.

Like a compressed air storage system, the power would come from the release of stored potential energy being converted into kinetic energy, and the system would absorb excess renewable energy during times of increased output.

Once at the bottom of the mine, the cable would once again lift the sand to a high point and the process would start over. This stage is called charging.

Benefits

Underground gravity energy storage could offer widespread solutions for some of the biggest issues with renewable power by storing energy in sand.

It could revitalise unused space – there’s little infrastructure building needed as abandoned mines could be utilised. It would also reduce the time, cost and environmental damage associated with building new energy storage centres.

UGES can also overcome the battery challenges associated with renewable energy storage. Battery metals are finite and acquiring them can be an arduous process involving poorly regulated mining.

This mining can harm the environment and the people who participate in it. There are also few resources for recycling spent battery metals. Unlike batteries, sand doesn’t degrade over time, making it a long-lasting or even permanent energy storage solution.

Gravity storage can also minimise wasted energy. In many cases, wind turbines generate electricity day and night, degrading them quickly and shortening their life span. That’s fine if all the energy is being put to use, but if it has nowhere to go, it is essentially wasted and shortening the wind turbines’ life span for no reason.

UGES would minimise wasted energy by storing it underground. Deeper mines could store and generate more energy. The investment costs of UGES would likely hover around $1/kWh and the technology could account for seven to 70 TWh globally, with most of it based in Russia, India, China and the US.

Potential downsides

While underground gravity energy storage looks promising, it might also run into some challenges. Long-abandoned mineshafts may not be ready for immediate use. Many mines could require reinforcement to make them safe for workers and machinery to enter, and the cost of renovation must be less than what the UGES system will be worth to make it economically viable.

And not all mine sites may be suitable. Deep, vertical mineshafts are the ideal location for underground energy storage systems. Although there are countless unused mines around the world, only some of them will have the right conditions to allow UGES solutions.

Equipment maintenance also needs to be a consideration. Compared to hydroelectric power plants — which often have a life span of over 100 years — researchers expect UGES sites to last only two to three decades. It’s still longer than the typical lithium battery’s life span, but technicians will have to take care to maintain equipment in the harsh, sandy conditions of the mines.

Harnessing gravity

Like an enormous underground hourglass, UGES could store renewably generated energy in the sand, raising and lowering the earth to capture and release the energy. It offers a unique solution for power storage compared to batteries, which degrade and slowly discharge energy over time.

The technology also looks promising for its ability to utilise previously abandoned mines. It could revitalise economies that previously collapsed after mine closures, bringing much-needed jobs to struggling cities. Time will tell if the energy storage solution of the future rests in the world’s empty mines.

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