Sustainability with AI
Use AI to reduce your environmental impact — from energy management and food waste reduction to sustainable transportation and smart water conservation — with practical tools and strategies for everyday green living.
What You'll Learn
- Explain how AI contributes to both environmental problems and solutions — including energy consumption, carbon emissions, and water usage alongside efficiency gains and waste reduction
- Use AI-powered tools to reduce home energy consumption through smart thermostats, energy monitoring, and automated optimization
- Apply AI strategies to reduce food waste through meal planning, expiration tracking, and smart grocery management
- Evaluate your personal carbon footprint using AI analysis and identify the highest-impact areas for reduction
- Design a sustainable transportation plan using AI route optimization, EV planning, and multimodal commuting strategies
- Create a personalized sustainability action plan that combines AI tools with behavioral changes for measurable environmental impact
Course Syllabus
Here’s a number that might surprise you: Google’s five AI-powered sustainability tools removed 26 million metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions in 2024 alone. That’s Nest thermostats learning when to heat your home, Maps finding fuel-efficient routes, and Solar API helping homeowners go solar.
But here’s the other side: a single ChatGPT request uses 10 times the electricity of a Google search. AI data centers could consume more energy than Belgium by 2026. The technology that can help save the planet is also accelerating its warming.
This course sits at that intersection. You’ll learn to use AI where it makes the biggest positive environmental difference — in your home energy, your food, your transportation, your shopping — while understanding the real costs and making choices that add up to genuine impact.
No greenwashing. No guilt trips. Just practical AI tools and strategies that reduce your footprint, save you money, and actually work.
This is a free course open to everyone.
Related Skills
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I need to buy smart home devices to benefit from this course?
No. Many lessons focus on free AI tools and strategies that work without special hardware. Smart home devices are covered but aren't required — you'll learn to reduce waste, plan sustainable meals, and optimize transportation using AI assistants you already have access to.
Doesn't AI itself use a lot of energy? Isn't using AI for sustainability contradictory?
It's a real tension, and we address it directly in Lesson 1. AI does consume significant energy, but when applied to sustainability, it can save far more than it uses. Google's five AI sustainability solutions removed 26 million metric tons of CO2 in 2024 alone. The key is using AI strategically where the environmental return exceeds the computational cost.
Is this course about corporate sustainability or personal sustainability?
Personal. Every lesson focuses on actions you can take in your own life — at home, in your kitchen, during your commute, and when you shop. The strategies scale from individuals to households.
How much can one person really change by using AI for sustainability?
More than you'd think. AI-optimized home energy can reduce consumption by 10-25%. Smart meal planning can cut food waste by 30-50%. Route optimization reduces fuel use by 10-15%. Combined, these add up to meaningful reductions — and they compound over time as the tools learn your patterns.