AT last week’s UN General Assembly (UNGA), the secretary-general focused on three existential threats to humanity: climate change, unchecked AI, and spiralling income inequality. It is clear that these threats are complex, intersecting and perceived with varying levels of concern by geopolitical heavyweights. But these threats are not intractable. The dizzying speed at which narratives shift in this social media era means we have moved quickly from catastrophising about the climate apocalypse to predicting myriad ways in which AI will ravage society and the planet. But such widespread despair never produced a good outcome.

It was helpful, then, to see more nuanced positions emerging from New York Climate Week, which unfolded at the same time as the UNGA. Here too, climate and AI were at the top of the agenda, but with less zero-sum messaging.

Undoubtedly, AI’s environmental impact is significant, and arguably unconscionable, given the scale of the climate crisis, and the failure to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Data centres that power AI use land, already scarce water supplies, and immense amounts of energy, still largely derived from fossil fuels. By 2030, 40 per cent of electricity used by data centres will be for AI........

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