MIT AI Risk Repository · Risk Sub-Category · 58.09.06
Excessive water consumption
Category: Environmental
Description
"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."
From A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024), as extracted by the MIT AI Risk Repository (CC BY 4.0).
Classification
- Subdomain
- 6.6 Environmental harm
- Causal entity
- Human
- Intent
- Unintentional
- Timing
- Other
Subdomain definition: 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.
Real-world incidents in this subdomain
Browse all incidents in this subdomainHow other frameworks describe this risk
- Accelerated development of nanotechnology produces uncontrolled production of toxic nanoparticles
- Environment
- Risks to the environment
- Risks to the environment
- Environmental risk
- 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 condemned/illegal
- AI harms animals due to mistake or misadventure in the way the AI operates in practice
Other entries from Abercrombie2024
- Autonomy
- Autonomy/agency loss
- Impersonation/identity theft
- IP/copyright loss
- Personality rights loss
- Physical
- Bodily Injury
- Loss of Life
- Personal Health Deterioration
- Property Damage
- "Psychological - Direct or indirect impairment of the emotional and psychological mental health of an individual, organisation, or society."
- Addiction