Without artificial assistance
When we started working on this issue of eco@work, one question came up repeatedly: should we use artificial intelligence to support the process? Should we feed in a study to see if it came up with anything useful? Or perhaps even conduct an interview with ChatGPT et al. and find out how AI rates its own performance on environmental and climate issues?
As you may have noticed already, a decision was taken to include an interview with Dr Heidy Khlaaf instead – and most of the rest of this issue was also produced without artificial assistance. That’s not to say that we don’t use AI from time to time – even in our research. Our colleagues from the Energy and Climate Division used ChatGPT in one of their projects in order to produce a summary of research papers, for example. I am convinced that we will increasingly outsource this type of task to AI in future. After all, it can make our work easier in many areas – for example, when searches, summaries or translations are required.
But away from the scientific field as well, artificial intelligence can make our lives easier and more enjoyable. I’m thinking, for example, of smart houses or apartments that control the heating, lighting and many other devices intelligently so that the occupants enjoy home comforts while also benefiting from efficiency. On matters of efficiency in particular, AI offers great potential – within our own four walls, but also in the operation of the power grids. As we show in this issue of eco@work, this technology creates countless opportunities – but also a multitude of risks, relating to social welfare, basic and human rights and the protection of the environment and climate. In the following pages, we look at why this is the case and how we can respond to these challenges.
With considerable misgivings here at the Oeko-Institut, we are seeing the major Internet companies now bringing nuclear power generation options back into play in response to AI’s vast energy demand. And yet with smarter AI programming, there are many opportunities to drastically reduce this energy hunger. That’s where the European AI development pathway should be heading.
Yours,
Anke Herold
Acting CEO of the Oeko-Institut e.V.