What Sustainability Can Learn From the AI Story
AI and sustainability both are clear and present topics that need urgent attention. However, the speed at which the former has captured people’s interest far outpaces the latter. Its immense popularity holds lessons about what sustainability can learn from AI in order for it to hold the world’s attention. Let’s go back a few years to study the impact both topics have had on the world.
Imagine it’s still October 2022, and ChatGPT hasn’t yet launched. The world continues to heat up with record carbon emissions, AI scientists are experimenting with data models inside big corporate labs. The scientists at The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists are making noise about 100 seconds to midnight on the doomsday clock. Yet the world mostly seems to be going on; it’s business as usual.
Just a month later, ChatGPT launched, and something shifted. Over the next few months, almost every company and startup in the world has positioned itself as an AI-first company. Even large conglomerates, which are usually slow-moving and want things to stabilize before committing uncharacteristically, begin establishing AI departments.
Contrast this with the story of sustainability. The frogs can really feel the water heating up. There is an enormous dinosaur in the room warning us not to choose extinction. Damages due to climate change have been increasing, soil productivity has been declining, and the list keeps getting longer. Here, too, despite cataclysmic events, it is mostly business as usual.
What’s Different, Really?
What is it about the AI story that stirred everyone into action, while the sustainability story simply hasn’t? What sustainability can learn from AI is important to understand in the context of their respective trajectories.
The early developments in both sustainability and AI started roughly around the same time—the 1950s. Both are really difficult subjects. This is because they have primarily been driven by scientists and not really favoured much by markets for many decades. So, what shifted in the past two years that AI exploded in everyday conversations while sustainability didn’t?
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Why is it that despite catastrophic floods in Spain, Pakistan, hurricanes in the US, and the 2024 temperature rise that each of us personally felt, none of our conversations around sustainability have taken on urgency?
Surprisingly, it isn’t data, proof, or credibility that’s making a difference. You would be really surprised how counterintuitive it is in some cases. As per research by the BSI group, “the willingness to pay for online news decreases by 30 percent when AI is used to research, prepare or create news”.
And while there’s some research that claims there is a benefit to AI-driven CRO, a lot of other research shows there’s business loss when consumer products use labels such as AI-powered. It not only reduces conversion rates but also a willingness to pay.
What Makes the AI Story Tick
So then, why are businesses getting so excited about being AI-first, but not sustainability-first?
Is it about the cost? Not really. AI isn’t necessarily cheap, and sustainability isn’t overtly costly. Prices of large-scale solar photovoltaics decreased by 89% between 2009 and 2019. Even more importantly, there are hundreds of companies that are offering solar installations to businesses on an OPEX model—the business doesn’t really need to pay a single rupee for installation or maintenance of the panels. There’s just a revenue share for the electricity produced—no risk, full reward. And yet, most solar installers spend months, if not years, trying to convince business owners of the benefits.
More organizations like Medius Earth are planting forests through permaculture using the same OPEX model. However, the business adoption rates are nowhere close to a normal technological advancement, forget the hyper-blitz pace of AI adoption. Why?
Is it about loss aversion? Seems quite doubtful. Just “duckduckgo” the pictures of the devastation caused by recent floods in Spain, Pakistan, and the loss-aversion theory jumps out the window. One would think incidents like these will drive stronger action. What we are seeing, though, is a few of the largest and most powerful companies cutting back on their sustainability commitments or downgrading the position of the CSO (Chief Sustainability Officer) from the board.
Then is it really about just self-interest and inertia? Kind of yes, but not exactly. If it were about inertia, businesses wouldn’t have adopted AI into their workflows so quickly; their revenue doesn’t multiply overnight. But yes, AI integrations are primarily being seen as future investments, not instant revenue boosters. Remember, most business and financial analysts aren’t very optimistic about the AI bets paying-off.
It’s All About the Narrative
Taking a comprehensive view, what sustainability can learn from AI lies in harnessing the kind of powerful narrative that advocates of the latter focused on. After all, wouldn’t all of us be concerned if the story was “AI won’t take your job/money/business, someone using an AI will”. Doesn’t that story speak to one of our deepest fears, and desire for security?
The stories of sustainability have been told in countless different ways—TED talks, documentaries, speeches, protests, movements, etc. Yet there seems to be a lack of urgency and hyper-personalization as there is about artificial intelligence. This, then, is the key element of what sustainability can learn from AI.
Come to think about it, we wouldn’t have adopted AI at this scale if the story was “adopt AI or someone will take your child’s future job”. What sustainability can learn from AI rests on replicating that relatable sense of urgency. A good one might be, “sustainability pays well, oh it pays massively”. Patagonia is a pioneering example. The job market too is predicted to show the same signs. Comprehensive research from Linkedin, Microsoft, Work on Climate, and BCG shows that the need for sustainability talent is rising at a much faster pace than the development and availability of skill in this space.
This is clearly not a story yet fully realized, but there is little doubt about the necessity to pay attention to sustainability and the need for more experts on the subject before it is too late. Because the signs are there—sustainability is the future.
NOTE: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and not of Emeritus.
