Actually, Sustainability IS for Everyone Issue 34: And so Is AI!

Chances are, you are hearing about Artificial Intelligence (AI) at every turn, and all of the amazing things it can be used for (never mind the potential security issues it also creates). There are some amazing things AI can do in the sustainability space, if you have the programmers behind it.? But what about those of us who do not have access to programmers to whip up some amazing AI algorithm, model, or application? There is still a lot that AI can contribute to your sustainability initiatives, using one of the simple AI chats (such as GPT, Claude, etc).

For instance, following are just a few things Chat GPT (or others) can be used for:

• Research Assistance: The AI can scour academic and industry sources for the latest in sustainability research, helping the director stay abreast of new findings, emerging technologies, and innovative practices relevant to municipal sustainability.
• Grant Writing and Fundraising: You can use AI to assist in drafting grant proposals and fundraising communications, maximizing opportunities to secure funding for local sustainability projects.
• Educational Content Creation: To enlighten the community about sustainability initiatives, AI can create engaging content, including blog posts, social media updates, and educational materials, tailored to different audience demographics.
• Policy Development Support: The AI can help in drafting policy documents by providing language suggestions, ensuring that policies are comprehensive and cover all necessary aspects of sustainability initiatives.
• Stakeholder Engagement: Engage citizens and stakeholders by using AI to craft surveys, questionnaires, and interactive platforms for collecting feedback on local environmental issues and proposed sustainability projects.
• Environmental Compliance: AI can assist in ensuring environmental compliance by helping review local regulations and standards, providing summaries and checklists for adherence by city departments and businesses.
• Public Speeches and Communications: AI can assist in crafting speeches, presentations, and public addresses on sustainability initiatives, tailored to resonate with local residents.
• Project Proposals and Management: The AI can help formulate project proposals for new sustainability initiatives, outline potential benefits and drawbacks, and assist in tracking the project timeline and deliverables.
• Language Translation: If needed, AI can assist in translating sustainability-related materials into different languages to cater to a diverse population.
• Climate Adaptation Strategies: Provide information on best practices for climate resilience and adaptation strategies relevant to your unique local environmental challenges, such as hurricane preparedness and flood mitigation.

Reminder: While AI can be an invaluable asset, you should always review and refine its outputs to ensure accuracy and appropriateness, and to maintain a human touch in your sustainability initiatives. It's also critical to ensure that the use of AI aligns with ethical standards and respects privacy and data protection laws.

By the way, all of those bullet points (and reminder) were written by GPT-4-Turbo.

AI can also help with generating images, like the avatar of me, below. While it doesn’t look like me, I feel like it captures my passion for the environment.

And my spirit animal:

Is it perfect? Not by a stretch; it also created the images below. They are both supposed to say Earth Day. The second has some remarkable snake-bird creatures I’ve thankfully never come into contact with here on Earth.

Fun aside, AI is progressing by leaps and bounds, seemingly daily. As our CEO, Stu Sjouwerman, SACP has reminded us, you won’t likely be replaced by AI, but you may be replaced by someone who knows how to work with AI. So I encourage you, no matter your field, to delve into AI, and see what it can do for you. Since it’s April, why don’t you see if it can come up with some cool Earth Day initiatives!