Companies need to stop taking the easy way out on climate goals
Science & Technology

Companies need to stop taking the easy way out on climate goals

Technology tamfitronics This article is from The Spark, MIT Technology Review’s weekly climate newsletter. To receive it in your inbox every Wednesday, sign up here. Corporate climate claims can be confusing—and sometimes entirely unintuitive. Tech giants Amazon and Google both recently released news about their efforts to clean up their climate impact. Both were a mixed bag, but one bit of news in particular made me prick up my ears. Google’s emissions have gone up, and the company stopped claiming to be “net zero” (we’ll dig into this term more in a moment). Sounds bad, right? But in fact, one might argue that Google’s apparent backslide might actually represent progress for climate action. My colleague James Temple dug into this news, along with the recent Amazon announcement, for a story this...
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Matt Kean bows out, taking what’s left of reforming politics with him
Politics

Matt Kean bows out, taking what’s left of reforming politics with him

Politics tamfitronics There’s a little irony in Matt Kean, former NSW treasurer and energy minister, announcing he was leaving politics for the private energy sector the day NSW Labor announced a string of deficits in its 2024 budgetand as Peter Dutton was finalising his harebrained scheme to build a fleet of nuclear power plants by 2050 — or, as the Coalition has now admitted, keep and even expand coal-fired power and bring an end to Australia’s transition to renewable energy.In the last NSW Coalition budget in 2022, Kean had forecast the state would finally return to surplus in the coming year — and today his successors actually have more revenue available than was expected back then. As for going nuclear, Kean had made his views clear when he bailed out of the “Coalition for Conservation”...
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Taking AI to the next level in manufacturing
Science & Technology

Taking AI to the next level in manufacturing

Technology tamfitronics Few technological advances have generated as great excitement as AI. Severely, generative AI looks to have taken industry discourse to a fever pitch. Many manufacturing leaders particular optimism: Learn conducted by MIT Technology Overview Insights stumbled on ambitions for AI vogue to be stronger in manufacturing than in most other sectors. Producers rightly detect AI as integral to the appearance of the hyper-computerized lustrous factory. They see AI’s utility in enhancing product and project innovation, cutting again cycle time, wringing ever extra effectivity from operations and sources, making improvements to repairs, and strengthening security, whereas cutting again carbon emissions. Some producers which have invested to develop AI capabilities are peaceable striving to construct their goals. This watch from MIT Technology Overview Insights seeks to label how producers are...
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