Smart Energy Voices - Episode 108

The Intersection of AI and Sustainability

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Salesforce's Initiatives and Sustainability Commitment

Salesforce has made sustainability a core value, aiming to reduce its own emissions by 50% by 2030 and to near zero by 2040. They achieved their 100% renewable energy commitment in 2021 by purchasing renewable energy certificates to match their global electricity use. Lorenzen talks about Salesforce’s focus on maximizing the benefits of clean energy to drive environmental and social co-benefits beyond renewable energy purchases.

Salesforce co-founded the Emissions First Partnership to measure and incentivize actions that maximize carbon reductions and co-founded Zero Grid to accelerate the transition to a zero-emission electricity grid. Salesforce also funds nonprofits advancing the just energy transition, making clean energy more affordable and equitable for underrepresented communities. Their comprehensive approach aims to leverage the full power of Salesforce to drive the energy transition and decarbonize the power sector.

The Impact of AI on the Electricity Grid

With the rise of AI, Lorenzen highlights its significant energy, water and other resource demands. With data centers currently representing about 1.5% of global power generation, forecasts suggest AI could increase this to 4.5% by 2030. The International Energy Agency (IEA) predicts that global data center electricity demand will double between 2022 and 2026, driven largely by AI. This rapid growth contrasts with several decades of flat or declining load growth.

The aging electricity grid in the U.S. now carries three times the electricity it was initially designed for. This grid urgently needs investment, with studies indicating that transmission capacity must increase two to three times to support the growing demand and ensure a reliable, decarbonized energy system. Additionally, extreme weather events are causing frequent power outages and driving peak demand. These factors underscore the urgent need to upgrade the electricity grid to meet the evolving demands of AI and climate change.

Salesforce’s Best Practices for Sustainable AI

Lorenzen explains Salesforce's perspective on the intersection of AI and sustainability. Despite concerns about AI's potential environmental impact, Salesforce views AI as both a challenge to and an opportunity for addressing environmental issues. Guided by core values including sustainability, they are committed to responsibly developing and deploying AI. The company also integrates sustainable practices into its operations and investments to ensure that AI development aligns with its environmental goals.

Lorenzen also outlines Salesforce’s best practices, such as focusing on developing domain-specific models tailored to their applications, and balancing cost, complexity, speed and emissions. This approach enhances efficiency and customer experience. The company prioritizes low-carbon data centers and invests in the latest, most efficient hardware for training AI models to help reduce its environmental impact. Additionally, Salesforce emphasizes transparency and has implemented strategies to measure and disclose the emissions impact of its AI, advocating for similar practices across the industry.

Salesforce’s Use of AI for Environmental Impact

Despite concerns about AI's environmental impact, Salesforce sees AI as a powerful tool for addressing climate change. AI's ability to analyze data, identify patterns, and predict outcomes is applied to enhance environmental stewardship.

Salesforce’s AI for Impact initiative exemplifies this approach by providing $2 million in funding, consulting, and product donations to nonprofits. These organizations use AI for climate-related projects like optimizing the distribution of donated goods to lower carbon footprints and managing electricity loads to reduce emissions. Their venture program invests in climate tech startups using AI for environmental benefits. Notable examples include PanoAI, which detects wildfires early, and Silveira, which estimates carbon stored in trees using AI and satellite data.

Sustainable Policy Initiatives

Lorenzen shares Salesforce’s new sustainable AI policy principles and about their collaboration with policymakers to promote responsible AI development. The company’s commitment to integrating climate action into its public policy platform includes advocating for science-based climate policies and developing principles for sustainable AI.

The new initiatives focus on two main areas: managing the environmental impact of AI models and encouraging climate innovation through AI. The three-pronged approach for managing impact involves requiring disclosure of AI’s energy efficiency and carbon footprint, considering environmental impact as a risk factor for high-risk AI models, and setting efficiency benchmarks. To promote innovation, Salesforce supports enhancing climate modeling capabilities, fostering public-private partnerships and incentivizing AI-driven environmental solutions.

Salesforce has seen a positive reception for these principles, with notable involvement in U.S. legislation such as the TAME Act, which promotes AI for extreme weather prediction, and the AI Environmental Impacts Act of 2024, aimed at creating standards for measuring AI's environmental impacts.

Guidance for Companies on Implementing AI Effectively

Lorenzen emphasizes that not every problem requires an AI solution and cautions against overimplementation of the innovation. Instead, companies should focus on implementing AI in areas with significant impact and start with small, iterative projects. She also advises ensuring that AI is developed and used in an equitable and sustainable manner, which includes evaluating suppliers' emissions impact and their commitment to responsible AI development.

Resources & People Mentioned:

• Shaping the Future: A Policy Framework for Trusted Enterprise AI
• Salesforce Paves the Way for More Sustainable and Equitable AI

Connect with Megan Lorenzen

• On LinkedIn

As Director of Climate & Energy at Salesforce, Megan Lorenzen leads Salesforce’s global climate policy program, advocating for policies that set the world on a path to a just transition to a 1.5-degree future. Megan also leads the company’s power sector decarbonization efforts. This includes catalyzing new, high-impact, renewable energy projects to maintain Salesforce’s global 100% renewable energy commitment and deploying the company’s cross-functional energy transition strategy.

Megan has a BS from Santa Clara University and an MBA from CU Boulder’s Leeds School of Business. Megan is the co-author of More than a Megawatt: Embedding Social & Environmental Impact in the Renewable Energy Procurement Process.