MIT AI Risk Repository · domain 6: Socioeconomic & Environmental
6.6 Environmental harm
The development and operation of AI systems causing environmental harm, such as through energy consumption of data centers, or material and carbon footprints associated with AI hardware.
- 57
- 12
- 1
- 1
| Label | Value |
|---|---|
| AI | 24 |
| Human | 15 |
| Other | 13 |
| Not coded | 4 |
| Label | Value |
|---|---|
| Unintentional | 35 |
| Other | 12 |
| Intentional | 5 |
| Not coded | 4 |
| Label | Value |
|---|---|
| Other | 24 |
| Post-deployment | 20 |
| Pre-deployment | 8 |
| Not coded | 4 |
| Label | Value |
|---|---|
| 2024 | 1 |
| Label | Value |
|---|---|
| Risk Category | 19 |
| Risk Sub-Category | 38 |
Risk entries
Browse and export all- Environmental
"Environmental - Damage to the environment directly or indirectly caused by a technology system or set of systems."
- Biodiversity loss
"Biodiversity loss - Over-expansion of technology infrastructure, or inadequate alignment of technology with sustainable practices, leading to deforestation, habitat destruction, and fragmentation and...
- Carbon emissions
"Carbon emissions - Release of carbon dioxide, nitric oxide and other gases, increasing carbon emissions, exacerbating climate change, and negatively impacting local communities."
- Electronic waste
"Electronic waste - Electrical or electronic equipment that is waste, including all components, sub-assemblies and consumables that are part of the equipment at the time the equipment becomes waste"
- Excessive energy consumption
"Excessive energy consumption - Excessive energy use, leading to energy bottlenecks and shortages for communities, organisations, and businesses."
- Excessive landfill
"Excessive landfill - Excessive disposal of electrical or electronic equipment leading to ecological/biodiversity damage, and disrupting the livelihoods and eroding the rights of local communities."
- Excessive water consumption
"Excessive water consumption - Excessive use of water to cool data centres and for other purposes, leading to water restrictions or shortages for local communities or businesses."
- Natural resource depletion
"Natural resource depletion - Extraction of minerals, metals, rare earths, and fossil fuels that deplete natural resources and increase carbon emissions."
- Pollution
"Pollution - Actual or potential pollution to the air, ground, noise, or water caused by a technology system."
- Environment
"AI is already helping to combat the impact of climate change with smart technology and sensors reducing emissions. However, it is also a key component in the development of nanobots, which could have...
- Accelerated development of nanotechnology produces uncontrolled production of toxic nanoparticles
"AI is a key component for the development of nanobots, which could have dangerous environmental implications by invisibly modifying substances at nanoscale. For example, nanobots could start chemical...
- Risks to the environment
"Growing compute use in general- purpose AI development and deployment has rapidly increased energy usage associated with general- purpose AI. This trend might continue, potentially leading to strongl...
- Risks to the environment
"General- purpose AI is a moderate but rapidly growing contributor to global environmental impacts through energy use and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Current estimates indicate that data centres a...
- Environmental risk
"AI models are often trained using large amounts of computation. This process is very energy intensive, potentially leading to significant greenhouse emissions depending on the energy sources [132]. E...
- Intentional: socially condemned/illegal
"Many intentional harms, including confinement, husbandry procedures like tail-docking, and slaughter, are legal or socially accepted, while others such as wildlife trafficking and violence against co...
- AI intentionally designed and used to harm animals in ways that contradict social values or are illegal
- AI designed to benefit animals, humans, or ecosystems is intentionally abused to harm animals in ways that contradict social values or are illegal
- Intentional: socially accepted/legal
"AI designed to impact animals in harmful ways that reflect and amplify existing social values or are legal"
- Unintentional: direct
"AI designed to benefit animals, humans, or ecosystems has unintended harmful impact on animals"
- AI is designed in a way that shows ignorant, reckless, or prejudiced lack of consideration for its impact on animals
- AI harms animals due to mistake or misadventure in the way the AI operates in practice
- Unintentional: indirect
"AI impacts human or ecological systems in ways that ultimately harm animals"
- Indirect Material Harms
"AI proliferation causes harm to the environment through energy use and e-waste thereby destroying animal habitat"
- Harms from Estrangement
"Replacement by AI of human observation and interaction leads to neglect of certain interests"
- Epistemic Harms
"Algorithmic recommender systems reinforce and amplify anthropocentric bias or desire of some people for animal cruelty as entertainment — leading to greater harm to animals through reinforcement of m...