Can Microsoft AI Help to Mitigate Climate Change?
By now everyone is aware of the power of AI. What is somewhat unknown is its potential applications – the ways in which we can harness it to solve sprawling, complex problems.
It is quickly becoming apparent that AI could be a powerful tool in the fight against climate change. From enhancing biodiversity monitoring to optimising resource management, AI is revolutionising the global approach to sustainability, offering unprecedented capabilities to monitor, predict and mitigate environmental issues.
Amy Luers, Senior Global Director of Sustainability at Microsoft, says: "Ecosystems are facing unprecedented threats of loss and degradation globally.
“To prevent these changes, we need to measure and predict the implications, because we cannot manage what we do not measure and we cannot protect what we cannot predict."
How AI can tackle water scarcity
One of the most pressing challenges in sustainability is water scarcity, particularly in agriculture, which consumes approximately 70% of the world's freshwater resources.
Microsoft's Project FarmVibes, a collaboration between Microsoft Research and farmers, leverages AI to address this issue through precision agriculture and smart water management.
By utilising satellites and sensors, the project predicts water shortages and surpluses, enabling farmers to conserve water during droughts and collect it efficiently during periods of excess.
The importance of Microsoft technology in farming
Agriculture is perhaps the industry most exposed to the effects of climate change, so Microsoft is keenly focused on protecting the sector.
In an online statement, the tech giant says: “Farmers depend on predictable weather for their farm management practices, and unexpected weather events — for example, high heat, floods — leaves them unprepared to handle impacts by climate change."
Microsoft explains the project's broader goals: "Through this project, our goal is to enable researchers, practitioners and data scientists to build affordable digital technologies to help farmers estimate the emissions in their farm, with climate adaptation by predicting weather variations, and determine the right management practices that can be profitable and help improve soil health."
How AI can help to understand ecosystems
Beyond agriculture, AI is amplifying understanding of natural ecosystems. In a novel approach to biodiversity monitoring, AI is being used to extract information from pollen collected by bees in southern Oregon, USA.
This data is providing researchers with a unique insight into local plant life and environmental health. Microsoft says that "tens of thousands of bees collect as many as four billion tiny samples a year across the Klamath River basin.
"Studying them closely leads to rediscovery of rare native plants and new species — to help local ecosystems thrive."
How AI can protect people from extreme weather events
AI's predictive capabilities are also proving invaluable in mitigating natural disasters, particularly wildfires exacerbated by drought. Alberta Wildfire, for instance, employs an AI-powered tool developed by AltaML to predict the likelihood of fires, analysing tens of thousands of data points to inform decision-making.
Microsoft highlights the environmental impact of such disasters: "Wildfires destroy large swathes of natural and human habitats, emitting massive carbon into the atmosphere. Companies like Vibrant Planet are helping prevent disasters like these by monitoring change and supporting real-time scenario planning to build wildfire and climate resilience."
As AI continues to evolve, its applications in sustainability are likely to expand, offering new avenues for environmental protection and resource management.
Amy explains: "To prevent these changes, we need to measure and predict the implications, because we cannot manage what we do not measure and we cannot protect what we cannot predict."
One threat to said ecosystems are wildfires, amplified by drought. AI’s predictive analysis capabilities allow those taking action against natural disasters to stay one step ahead.
Alberta Wildfire, for example, uses an AI-powered tool built by AltaML to make decisions, leveraging machine learning to analyse tens of thousands of data points to predict the next day’s likelihood of fires.
“Wildfires destroy large swathes of natural and human habitats, emitting massive carbon into the atmosphere,” Microsoft says.
“Companies like Vibrant Planet are helping prevent disasters like these by monitoring change and supporting real-time scenario planning to build wildfire and climate resilience.”
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