Environmental footprint of AI
Training and operating AI systems consume substantial energy, water, and materials, producing carbon emissions, e-waste, and ecosystem harm.
- Risk family
- Governance & process
- MIT domain
- 6. Socioeconomic and Environmental
- MIT subdomain
- 6.6 > Environmental harm
- AI type
- GPAI, Classical_ML, Agentic
- Scope
- Both
- Source standard
- MIT AI Risk Repository v4
Provenance
52 entries across 28 papers
- Abercrombie2024A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms58.09.00 58.09.01 58.09.02 58.09.03 58.09.04 58.09.06 58.09.07 58.09.08
- Bengio2024International Scientific Report on the Safety of Advanced AI49.03.04
- Bengio2025International AI Safety Report 202560.03.04
- Chin2025Dimensional Characterization and Pathway Modeling for Catastrophic AI Risks68.05.00
- Clarke2023A Survey of the Potential Long-term Impacts of AI: How AI Could Lead to Long-term Changes in Science, Cooperation, Power, Epistemics and Values55.02.04
- Coghlan2023Harm to Nonhuman Animals from AI: a Systematic Account and Framework44.01.01 44.01.02 44.02.00 44.03.00 44.03.01 44.03.02 44.04.00 44.05.00
- Cunha2023Navigating the Landscape of AI Ethics and Responsibility03.06.00
- EPIC2023Generating Harms - Generative AI's impact and paths forwards31.06.00
- G'sell2024Regulating under Uncertainty: Governance Options for Generative AI47.04.05 47.04.06
- Gabriel2024The Ethics of Advanced AI Assistants24.09.03
- Gipiškis2024Risk Sources and Risk Management Measures in Support of Standards for General-Purpose AI Systems62.11.01 62.12.01 62.39.01
- GOS2023Future Risks of Frontier AI56.03.00
- Hagendorff2024Mapping the Ethics of Generative AI: A Comprehensive Scoping Review05.15.00
- IBM2025AI Risk Atlas65.23.06
- Leech2024Ten Hard Problems in Artificial Intelligence We Must Get Right54.01.02
- Li2025A Closer Look at the Existing Risks of Generative AI: Mapping the Who, What, and How of Real-World Incidents66.12.01 66.12.02
- NIST2024Artificial Intelligence Risk Management Framework: Generative Artificial Intelligence Profile48.05.00
- Paes2023Social Impacts of Artificial Intelligence and Mitigation Recommendations: An Exploratory Study10.09.00
- Saghiri2022A Survey of Artificial Intelligence Challenges: Analyzing the Definitions, Relationships, and Evolutions39.02.00
- Shelby2023Sociotechnical Harms of Algorithmic Systems: Scoping a Taxonomy for Harm Reduction11.05.05
- Solaiman2023Evaluating the Social Impact of Generative AI Systems in Systems and Society13.01.06 13.02.05
- Stahl2024The Ethics of ChatGPT - Exploring the Ethical Issues of an Emerging Technology32.04.00
- Tan2022The Risks of Machine Learning Systems15.02.00 15.02.05
- Tang2025Risks of AI Scientists: Prioritizing Safeguarding Over Autonomy71.03.01
- Uuk2025A Taxonomy of Systemic Risks from General-Purpose AI61.01.05 61.02.23
- Weidinger2021Ethical and social risks of harm from language models17.06.00 17.06.01
- Weidinger2022Taxonomy of Risks posed by Language Models16.06.00 16.06.01
- Weidinger2023Sociotechnical Safety Evaluation of Generative AI Systems18.06.00 18.06.02
Ev IDs of the entries consolidated into this risk in the MIT AI Risk Repository (V4); the source sheet row appears on hover.
Framework crosswalk
Every framework item mapped to this risk. Items marked partial overlap only in part; definitions appear on hover where the source licence permits.
1- A.5 ISO/IEC 23894 Annex A A.5
1- A.4.5 ISO/IEC 42001 Annex A A.4.5
3- ibm-ai-agents-impact-on-environment AI agents' impact on environment
- ibm-impact-on-the-environment Impact on the environment
- ibm-redundant-actions Redundant actions partial
1- GENAI.5 Environmental Impacts
More in Governance & process
See all Governance & process risks →Part of the Deployer AI Risk Register, an open-source resource powered by MindXO. Version 1.0, 3 July 2026. Derived from the MIT AI Risk Repository (V4, December 2025) under CC BY 4.0; an independent derivative work, not endorsed by or affiliated with MIT. Sub-risk decomposition references MITRE ATLAS™ v5.6.0 (© 2021-2026 The MITRE Corporation, reproduced and distributed with permission). ISO/IEC and EU AI Act references are by number only. License: CC BY 4.0. Full attribution and licensing.