As New York Climate Week 2025 draws to a close, this fortnight’s newsletter highlights the multiple, sometimes conflicting, ways artificial intelligence (AI) is shaping our climate future and geopolitics with it.
On the one hand, Nvidia is backing UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer and pushing billions into Britain’s AI infrastructure—but only if gas and nuclear can prop it up. On the other, governments like the Philippines are embedding AI into disaster response, showing how the technology can serve the public good. In the U.S., despite the rhetoric of the current administration and weakened national climate funding, states, cities, and major corporations showcased subnational momentum, with the U.S. Climate Alliance reporting a 24 % emissions drop since 2005 even as GDP grew, underscoring that climate action and economic growth can align.
Meanwhile, corporate giants like Amazon claim AI could be climate’s most powerful ally, even as the advertising industry backtracks on climate commitments in fear of being replaced by the very technology it once embraced.
The takeaway from Climate Week: AI could accelerate climate solutions – but only if its own carbon and water costs are tamed and strong governance ensures technology serves the planet, not undermines it. Here are the five key themes to focus on today:
1. Britain’s AI boom meets its gas reality
Nvidia’s CEO Jensen Huang has warned that Britain’s drive to become an AI hub will require natural gas alongside nuclear and renewables (Field, 2025). With plans to invest £11bn in UK data centres — including £500m in operator Nscale — this expansion could supercharge the economy but risks locking the country into fossil dependence.
Energy Secretary Ed Miliband, who has pledged to ban fracking, faces the uncomfortable prospect of new gas turbines being built to power the AI economy. Labour leader Keir Starmer has reportedly urged Huang to fast-track Britain’s AI capacity, suggesting that political pressure to accelerate growth may outweigh sustainability concerns.
Huang insists Nvidia will “push just about every possible angle” to curb AI’s carbon footprint, from exploring small modular nuclear reactors to designing more efficient chips. He argues that the long-term climate benefits of AI breakthroughs could offset their short-term energy costs. Yet this remains a gamble: banking on speculative future gains while inflating emissions in the present risks undermining Britain’s net-zero targets.
2. AI for disaster resilience in the Philippines
In contrast, the Philippines offers a glimpse of AI being integrated for direct public benefit. The Department of Environment and Natural Resources, working with the Tony Blair Institute, has embedded AI into disaster planning (Caneba, 2025). Using remote sensing and satellite data, AI-powered models are enabling faster and more accurate risk assessments — with remarkable results.
Rain-induced landslide detection that once took a week can now be completed in two hours, with staffing needs cut by 75% and national detection coverage soaring from 0.3% to 19%. This has allowed the government to update landslide susceptibility models annually rather than every five years, potentially saving thousands of lives.
Globally, landslides have killed more than 160,000 people in the past two decades (Haque et al., 2019). The Philippines’ case shows how AI, when embedded in governance, can deliver efficiencies that matter: better preparedness, quicker responses, and ultimately, reduced human and economic loss.
3. Amazon bets on AI as climate’s “most powerful tool”
Amazon’s sustainability chief recently declared that AI could become “climate’s most powerful tool” (Fortune, 2025). Through its “3D Sustainability” framework — digitising data, discovering insights, and delivering breakthroughs — Amazon claims AI is already transforming climate action from incremental to exponential.
In 2024, the company processed 15 billion carbon-related data points, compressing months of scientific analysis into minutes and conducting over 4,000 product lifecycle assessments in a single quarter. AI has already uncovered inefficiencies like underground water leaks, preventing nine million gallons of waste annually.
But critics argue that such claims mask the enormous environmental costs of scaling AI itself. Data centres already account for 1.5% of global electricity use, projected to double by 2030 (LSE Grantham Institute, 2025). Without transparent reporting and firm regulation, the sector risks greenwashing its way into legitimacy, presenting AI as a saviour while externalising its true footprint.
4. Advertising giants backtrack on climate
Perhaps the most revealing story this week comes from the advertising sector. Agencies once known for producing hard-hitting climate campaigns against fossil giants like Shell are now quietly rolling back their rhetoric (Bryan, 2025).
Fearful of being displaced by AI-generated content, the “Big Six” — Omnicom, Interpublic, Publicis, Dentsu, WPP, and Havas — are reembracing oil and gas clients, shifting the narrative from climate emergency to “energy security.” Interpublic has even reworded policies to justify campaigns for Aramco, ExxonMobil, and QatarEnergy.
This isn’t just about advertising — it’s about how public opinion on climate is shaped. When creative industries that influence policymakers and consumers dilute their climate commitments to stay afloat, the indirect impacts of AI become clear: it doesn’t just consume energy, it reshapes political and cultural landscapes in ways that can entrench fossil power.
Final Thought
These stories highlight AI’s Janus-faced role in sustainability. On one side, it promises faster disaster responses, more efficient operations, and breakthroughs that could accelerate the low-carbon transition. On the other, it risks reinforcing dependence on fossil fuels, consuming vast resources, and even shifting industries away from climate advocacy.
The real question is not whether AI will influence our climate trajectory — it already is. The question is whether governments, corporations, and civil society can steer it toward equity, resilience, and sustainability, rather than short-term profits and entrenched interests.
