Subj : IBM is teaming up with NASA to combat climate change with geospat
To   : All
From : TechnologyDaily
Date : Thu Nov 30 2023 05:15:05

IBM is teaming up with NASA to combat climate change with geospatial AI

Date:
Thu, 30 Nov 2023 05:00:55 +0000

Description:
Combining AI with geospatial mapping can help predict weather patterns, but 
what does it mean for climate change?

FULL STORY
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Ahead of COP28, IBM has today announced a collaboration with NASA, Mohamed 
Bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence, the Government of Kenya, and 
the United Kingdoms Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) Hartree 
Centre to throw its weight behind efforts to combat climate change. 

The collaboration will see enhanced research and development into geospatial 
mapping and AI, in the hopes of developing a multi-modal foundation model for 
weather prediction. 

Alongside weather prediction, the model will help combat climate change and 
its effects through analyzing heat islands, mapping reforestation efforts, 
and predicting the impact of extreme weather events. A rainy renaissance 

In the fight against climate change, new technologies can provide an edge in 
predicting and tackling extreme weather, alongside analyzing the impact of 
projects such as reforestation. 

With this collaboration, IBM hopes to produce a tunable foundational model to 
help with weather and climate prediction that, when finished, will be 
open-source and publicly available to allow unhindered global research to 
take place. 

Last year, the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasting began 
using AI emulators with historical data to generate forecasts more accurately 
than ever before. A screenshot from GeoFM, showing flooding in Port de Lanne, 
France. (Image credit: NASA) 

It is worth noting that AI emulators are developed with the intention of 
performing one specific task from one data set, but provide the benefit of 
not requiring high performance computing (HPC) solutions. Instead, these AI 
emulators can be run on a desktop computer in a matter of minutes. 

Therefore, by creating a foundational model trained on the 40 years of 
weather observations within the MERRA2 dataset, pre-trained AI emulators can 
be developed and distributed to researchers, resulting in faster scientific 
discoveries. 

Climate change is a real and pressing issue that we must find new ways to 
address as quickly and efficiently as possible, including through todays most 
advanced AI technologies, said Alessandro Curioni, IBM Fellow and Vice 
President, Accelerated Discovery at IBM 

AI foundation models utilizing geospatial data can be a game-changer because 
they allow us to better understand, prepare and address the many 
climate-related events effecting the health of our planet in a manner and 
speed never before seen. 

We are hopeful these technologies can help accelerate the rate at which we 
derive and apply solutions for a safer and healthier planet for future 
generations. More from TechRadar Pro Google going green - new geothermal 
energy plant opens in Nevada Many of the world's biggest tech firms are 
majorly falling behind on emissions Check out the best green web hosting 
providers around



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Link to news story:
https://www.techradar.com/pro/ibm-is-teaming-up-with-nasa-to-combat-climate-ch
ange-with-geospatial-ai


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