Salesforce: Why AI can be Beneficial for the Planet

Salesforce is a cloud-based software company that provides customer relationship management based solutions. 

The company has produced its AI sustainability outlook, accumulating its work to understand how AI has an impact on sustainability. 

Sunya Norman, SVP Impact, Salesforce, said on Linkedin: “As a leader in agentic AI, it is Salesforce's imperative to ensure that AI is trusted, reliable and sustainable. 

“In this outlook, we explore the current landscape, our efforts and evolving insights so far, and our preliminary path forward. We’re early in the journey, but the future is being shaped now. 

“By sharing our progress openly, we aim to spark transparency and inspire collective action. A sustainable future with AI is within reach, and I’m optimistic about what we can achieve together.”

How AI impacts the environment 

Salesforce's report outlines that, by 2030, AI data centres could reach around 3% of global electricity consumption, as they require more electricity and more sophisticated cooling systems to prevent overheating.

Gartner warns that 40% of AI data-centre projects could hit power bottlenecks as early as 2027, threatening the delayed growth of AI and resulting in higher costs and power reliability disruption.

Fossil fuels currently supply 56% of the energy for data centres globally. Increased demand, as well as the use of fossil fuels, could cause emissions to rise. 

The International Energy Agency reports that, if data centres don't move to using clean power, the infrastructure could become the fastest-growing source of global emissions.

As well as energy, AI consumes a lot of water for its cooling systems, with one fifth of data centre services water coming from moderately to high water stressed watersheds.

What's more, the building of AI compute uses several mining techniques to source critical minerals like lithium and copper. Mining involves energy and water-intensive processes, emitting pollutants and environmental degradation.

Enhancing sustainability

While powering data centres that provide AI capabilities can have a negative impact on the environment, it can be used as a powerful tool for sustainability. 

The IEA estimates that AI solutions could reduce energy-related emissions by around 5% by 2035.

Salesforce says AI can be helpful at tackling data-driven tasks like:

• Transforming complex systems
• Accelerating discovery and innovation
• Driving behavioural change 
• Improving climate and policy modelling
• Enhancing adaption and resilience 

Energy efficiency can be improved by AI through various methods like predictive maintenance, integration or renewables and personalised energy insights. 

It can also improve water management by providing smart irrigation, waste water treatment optimisation and water quality monitoring.

Harnessing AI’s abilities

Salesforce AI innovation Agentforce is being used to make several sustainability impacts.

The company reports that Good360 is tackling getting the right aid to the right people during natural disasters.

Good360 is building a resource matching agent that automates the donating routing process, prioritising the areas that need it most.

Stephane Moulec, Chief Technology Officer at Good360 says “Globally, a significant amount of goods that could be matched to disaster survivors end up going to the landfill. Good360 is here to change that.”

Rare is launching an AI-powered regenerative agriculture coach, delivering real-time and localised guidance based on crops, weather data and agroecological conditions. 

The first phase of the agent is supposed to support 5,00 farmers, reducing staff times by 40%.

Groundswell is using AI to cut people's electricity bills but scaling community solar. The technology will help around 30,000 households save money, by cutting energy burdens in half.

Salesforce's approach

Salesforce says its approach focuses on three core pillars: 

• Smart demand
• Efficiency 
• Clean supply

Smart demand

Not all AI tools are suited to every project. Salesforce believes AI should be selected based on what type and how much to use individually for each project. 

The company says to avoid unnecessary usage of AI by considering more efficient models that use simpler algorithms. 

Companies should be transparent with customers, fostering flexibility with when and how data centres consume power. Salesforce also suggests using incentives to encourage efficiency when using AI.

Efficiency

Salesforce suggests that others should continue to develop and deploy smaller AI models. Agents that are purpose built can outperform larger general purpose models in both speed and efficiency.

Companies can do this by using quantisation, distillation and pruning techniques, helping streamline models for lower compute without sacrificing quality.

Using smaller AI models to power smaller devices can take pressure off large data centres, saving energy and improving efficiency.

Clean supply

AI can source more sustainable suppliers, Salesforce says embedding sustainability across procurement can drive change far beyond the company's own footprint.

Companies using AI should invest in clean power and water to serve it.

Businesses should also advocate for systematic change infrastructure and policies governing AI’s environmental impact.