AI Boom To Trigger Thousands Of Deaths, $20 Billion In Health Costs: Study

With the exponential rise of AI in many professional sectors, there has been a boom in gadgets powered by AI. This revolution in technology will definitely make life easier with much advancement; however, there is a new environmental footprint as well. There are significant concerns related to increased air pollution through the emissions of power plants and diesel backup generators, which are a requirement for maintaining steady electricity supplies for the increasing network of data centres and computer processing centers. These facilities are critical for AI operations and contribute increasingly to the level of air pollution; hence, sustainable solutions to innovation need to be developed to maintain environmental responsibility.

As per a release by the University of California, this air pollution is expected to result in as many as 1,300 premature deaths a year by 2030 in the United States. Total public health costs from cancers, asthma, other diseases, and missed work and school days are approaching an estimated $20 billion a year. 

Such are the findings of a study by UC Riverside and Caltech scientists published online this week. Yet, these human and financial costs appear overlooked by the tech industry.

"If you look at those sustainability reports by tech companies, they only focus on carbon emissions, and some of them include water as well, but there's absolutely no mention of unhealthful air pollutants, and these pollutants are already creating a public health burden," said Shaolei Ren, a UCR associate professor of electrical and computer engineering and a corresponding author of the study.

The authors, including Caltech professor and computer scientist Adam Wierman, recommend that standards and methods be adopted that require tech companies to report the air pollution caused by their power consumption and backup generators.

They further recommend that communities hit hardest by air pollution from data processing centre electricity production be properly compensated by the tech companies for the health burden.

The authors also found that air pollution stemming from AI disproportionately affects certain low-income communities, partly because of their proximity to power plants or backup generators at the data processing centers. Additionally, the pollution drifts across county and state lines, creating health impacts on communities far and wide, Ren said. 

"The data centres pay local property taxes to the county where they operate," Ren said. "But this health impact is not just limited to a small community. Actually, it travels across the whole country, so those other places are not compensated at all."