Irish Examiner view: AI becoming an own goal for humanity

One analysis argued that AI could be responsible for half the electricity use by data centres by the end of this year

While AI technology as a whole has plenty of productivity and other potential benefits — for instance, in science, health, or technology — the environmental impact is stark. File Picture: Denis Minihane.

Between the US eating itself alive like a snake feasting on its own tail, Russia continuing to assault Ukraine, and the devastation in Gaza, climate change almost seems like a hoary old chestnut. A relic of another time, perhaps.

And yet that doesn’t stop us feeling it. We’ve just been through the driest spring for European farmers in a century; last week brought an “unprecedented” heatwave to the waters around Ireland, Devon, and Cornwall; and Europe’s supplies of cocoa, wheat, and maize are now threatened by biodiversity collapse in exporting countries.