NEW YORK — As scientists calculated that Earth is getting sicker, global leaders on Monday kicked off a week of talks about how to fix it and fast, pointing to hope from a renewable energy boom.
A different boom, in artificial intelligence and the power-and-water-hungry data centers behind it, could both worsen and solve some of these issues, a paradox world and business leaders will struggle with this week.
Every year as top government officials attend the United Nations General Assembly and business executives flock to New York Climate Week sessions, global warming generates lots of talk but little action.
This time two new forces — the rise of AI and data centers, as well as higher fossil fuel prices from wars in Iran and Ukraine — should change the discussion, experts and activists said. That's on top of climate-driven disasters recently reaching new levels of destruction in Asia.
“Patient Earth is not well,” said Johan Rockström, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany. “We are not only putting the stability, the resilience, and the life support systems on Earth at risk, we are very close to pushing ourselves across thresholds that can lead to irreversible, unmanageable outcomes.”
A new report released Monday by the institute's Planetary Boundaries Science Lab found that the world has breached seven of nine science-determined planetary boundaries for a healthy globe.
United Kingdom Secretary of State Edward Miliband said that transitioning to cleaner and renewable energy is now a “national security imperative.”
The climate breakdown “must be an issue for foreign ministers and prime ministers. As well as energy and climate ministers. The security community, not just the activist community. The generals, not just the green campaigners,” he said.
Rising prices drive concerns
Climate change is "driving up food prices and wider inflation" and fossil fuel dependence is hitting billions of people around the world at the fuel pump, said U.N. climate chief Simon Stiell on Monday.
Rising prices have sparked protests in Asia and Africa, which were hit first and hardest by energy shortages due to the Iran war. In the U.S., consumer confidence is plunging and gas prices have reached record highs.
The Iran war energy shock has cost U.S. consumers more than $100 billion in higher fuel prices, Stiell said.
There are two parallel climate stories playing out at the moment, explained Mohamed Adow, director of Power Shift Africa. The first story is extremely hopeful, with renewable energy booming, technology improving and the economics of clean energy making more and more sense. The second story is terrifying, with climate impacts accelerating faster than political and financial systems can respond, Adow said.
“New York needs to bring those two stories together,” he said.
AI and data centers take the limelight
The environmental footprint of AI and data centers is “very much a hot topic,” said Helen Clarkson, CEO of the nonprofit Climate Group, which organizes New York Climate Week.
Attendees have so far expressed both hopes and fears for the future of AI and its role in combating climate change, she said.
" Energy-guzzling artificial intelligence is driving up planet-heating pollution from coal, oil and gas while ratcheting up energy costs for households and businesses," said Stiell with the U.N. "AI leaders are now on thin ice when it comes to license to operate, and sinking deep underwater when it comes to public support."
On the other hand, Eva Riesenhuber, the head of sustainability at the German automation company Siemens, and Evelyn Wang, vice president for energy and climate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said AI is too important to humanity and will help tackle climate change.
Data centers adding to climate and water problems “is not forever,” according to Wang, who told The Associated Press that data centers are five years away from being water neutral and about a decade away from no longer adding to planet-warming emissions.
Acknowledging these concerns, Riesenhuber said “we are racing to mitigate this as fast as possible because we are hooked on the intelligence, and we do need the intelligence to design the future that this planet needs.”
There will be several AI-related protests throughout New York Climate Week.
Turkey, which is running UN climate negotiations this November, recently announced a new pledge for nations to join to manage the powering and deployment of AI, though no further details were offered.
The AI issue may mean construction in people’s backyards, which reaches those who are less worried about climate change, according to Jennifer Morgan, an analyst at The Fletcher School at Tufts University, who said that AI is becoming more vilified in climate talks than the fossil fuel industry.
World leaders to discuss renewable rollout
The world can still meet its 2023 goal of tripling renewable power capacity by the end of the decade, but it must move much faster, according to a new report released Monday.
Despite record growth in renewables last year, the world must build more renewable power capacity from 2026 to 2030 than in all previous years combined, stated the report by the International Renewable Energy Agency, the Global Renewables Alliance and Turkey.
The amount of renewable power added globally peaked at 693 gigawatts in 2025, about half the installed power in the U.S., IRENA found. At the same time, there was a sharp rebound of fossil fuels when compared to 2024 driven by China adding coal power.
“The journey so far on renewables is remarkable,” Rockström said.
Unfortunately, Rockström said, renewables are meeting a growing demand for electricity but not “bending the curve” to reduce oil, coal or gas use — which is necessary to cut carbon pollution and meet climate targets.
Paradoxically, military action waged by U.S. President Donald Trump in Venezuela and Iran and Russian leader Vladimir Putin in Ukraine — both big fossil fuel advocates — have caused oil and gas shortages that have driven up prices, spurring countries to switch to renewables faster, he explained.
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Associated Press reporter Anton L. Delgado in New York contributed to this report.
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