This one is going to be more of a personal note, but it’s finally the last week of the RAND Master’s of Technology Program (MTP) 😁. I can’t believe we’re advancing on Week 10 which is the final week of the final quarter of the final countdown (yes, a lot of finals in that one sentence). Anyway, hard to believe 9 months full-time passed by like that in a flash…

What comes next? Great question! I might take a couple of weeks off to settle some life affairs that I was putting off because of school 🤔. There’s a lot of the same AI policy fellowships that I’m also spotting in DC again that have July deadlines… I might apply for all of those again with the data center angle that I have now.

I guess finding the next full-time job is going to be the main move over summer? I’ll still be continuing this, the LinkedIn brand, and prototyping some project ideas that I got.

I also got to weigh whether staying in DC is the right move if I don’t find anything. My life was quite literally put on pause when I had to leave to take care of family last summer. I was gone for a WHILE.💀

Anyway, here are some interesting news articles of the week:

Ciao, 👋

Nate

Sustainable AI Data Centers for a Carbon-Free Future (AI & Data Centers/Hardware): Susanna Kass on how absolute-zero data center design, grid collaboration, and circular-economy thinking can make data centers sustainable and capital-efficient as AI demand accelerates.

Data Centers & Planning for Industrial Noise with Claire Pincock (AI & Data Centers/Hardware): Industrial audio engineer Claire Pincock breaks down the noise problems data centers create near communities, and what can be done to avoid them.

The $7 Trillion Secret Destroying the Planet (AI & Environment): Tim Christophersen walked away from a UN contract running to 2038 and a diplomatic passport. That decision says a lot about where he thinks the real environmental leverage actually is.

Data Center Workload Flexibility for Power System Demand Response: Evidence from Alibaba Traces (AI & Data Centers/Hardware/Model): A quantitative framework to assess and activate data center flexibility by deferring non-critical, high-latency IT workloads. Authors: Caprara et al. Journal: International Journal of Electrical Power & Energy Systems.

MetaBeeAI: An AI Pipeline for Structured Evidence Extraction from Biological Literature (AI & Ecology/Biodiversity): An open-source, modular LLM pipeline that turns structured data extraction from biology papers into a coherent, auditable, expert-in-the-loop workflow. Authors: Parkinson et al. Journal: Ecological Informatics.

Greening Multi-Tenant Data Center Demand Response (AI & Energy): Proposes ColoEDR, a pricing mechanism that gets colocation tenants to cut load during emergency demand response events, reducing reliance on backup diesel generators. Authors: Chen et al. Journal: arXiv.

24/7 Carbon-Free Energy for All: Towards a Resilient Energy System (Climate & Energy Policy): The case for 24/7 carbon-free energy as the backbone of a resilient, decarbonized power system. Authoring Body: Global Renewables Alliance.

Energy Vampires: The AI Data Centers Draining Australia (AI & Infrastructure): A report arguing the frenzied data center rollout would derail Australia's energy transition, and calling for a moratorium. Authoring Body: Greenpeace Australia.

Evaluating Potential Artificial Intelligence Energy Capacity at Different Data Center Sites (AI & Energy): The third in RAND's series on AI power demand, grading 22 US sites on their capacity to support hyperscale AI development by 2030. Authoring Body: RAND.

Drew Maloney, Edison Electric Institute | The Politics of Power (AI & Energy): EEI's president makes the surprising case that data centers may actually lower electric bills, and that deregulation hurts the marketplace, across grid reliability and the politics of permitting.

Inside The Secretive World of America's AI Data Centers (AI & Multiple Applications): Business Insider's deep dive reveals, for the first time, the true cost of the warehouses feeding our appetite for cloud computing and AI.

Data Center Alleys Part 2: The Raw Reality Families Face as Data Centers Take Over NEPA (AI & Environmental Impact): A look on Jamie Walsh's channel at the reality families face as data centers reshape northeastern Pennsylvania.

Verna (AI & Environment): A software platform for nature recovery, helping solve biodiversity data challenges and drive projects from plan to proof. Location: United Kingdom.

SeaBridge Sustainability (AI & Ocean Science): Through its SeaBridgeAI platform, it streamlines sustainability data workflows, translates raw inputs into GRESB-aligned metrics, and benchmarks performance with predictive analytics. Location: North America.

Seascape Aquatech Inc. (AI & Ocean Science): Using robotic automation to improve farmed shellfish yields and quality while drastically cutting production costs. Location: North America.

Data Center Rejection Database (AI & Infrastructure): Tracks where local governments and regulators across the US, UK, and Europe are rejecting or restricting data center projects through moratoria, planning refusals, zoning limits, and permitting. Price: FREE.

Is AI Profitable Yet? (AI & Policy): A real-time scoreboard tracking cumulative spend versus revenue across frontier AI companies, visualizing the gap between massive capex and current returns. Price: FREE.

Overture Maps (AI & Geospatial Analysis): An open, interoperable map data platform providing free, standardized global geographic datasets with stable entity identifiers for combining data across sources. Price: FREE

If you have resources that you wish to submit to the AI & Environment Resource Hub, fill out the Google Form! Thank you for suggesting resources to add to the Resource Hub. 🙃

I made this last week on my LinkedIn and it went ballistic (lol). Enjoy!

Thanks for reading the 43rd issue of The Climate Code! It means a lot to me and we have more coming in the future, so definitely stick around! 💚

Nate

P.S.

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