NVIDIA, an American microchip maker, reports that it is developing the Earth’s digital twin. It
is to help humanity fight climate change. Using a number of its products, the company wants
to simulate the impacts of human activity on the planet, and thereby mitigate the
consequences of the inevitable. However, they are not the first to come up with such a
vision. And there are also opinions that the Earth would need less ostentatious gestures and
more small actions.

American supercomputer Earth 2

At the GPU Technology Conference in November last year, NVIDIA’s CEO reported that they
were working on the Earth’s digital twin. It will be the new E2 (Earth 2) supercomputer. It
aims to model the planet’s climate to accurately reflect the local effects of its changes up to
30 years in advance. Jensen Huang also announced a partnership between NVIDIA and the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology to provide all climate scientists with a space to share
data and resources.

The company has already taken the first concrete steps in the field of environmental
protection by concluding another partnership, this time with Lockheed Martin’s AI center. A
joint initiative working with advanced artificial intelligence and machine learning increases
the accuracy of forest fire forecasts.

As verdict.co.uk writes, NVIDIA, as an established simulation specialist with extensive IA
capabilities, has the potential to actually create the digital twin planet. But the amount of
data and variables they will work with is unimaginably large. According to the CEO, NVIDIA
Modulus was developed specifically for this purpose. It uses models of principled physics
and observation data to teach artificial intelligence to predict the climate in super real time.
The module will continuously adjust, calibrate, and improve the predictions, using the
observed data, allowing it to generate predictions over and over again. The director hopes to
be able to present real outputs in “a few years”.

European “Destination Earth” project¨

It’s also worth mentioning the European project with the same mission. They even came up
with the idea of the Earth’s digital twin six months earlier than NVIDIA did. Last spring, the
European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts presented its DestinE (Destination
Earth) project. It has several advantages over NVIDIA, as it is a partner of the European Space
Agency (ESA) and the European Organization for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites
(EUMETSAT). Both entities have extensive experience with weather forecasting, as well as
access to Earth observation data, which are two essential sources of data in the
development of the digital twin. However, they do not have the software and artificial
intelligence features that NVIDIA claims are critical to the project.

… or less grandeur and a faster effect

The Glasgow-based technology company, Simul8, is another way to combat climate change.
Frances Sneddon says that the fight against the crisis does not have to be so spectacular to be effective. There is obviously no panacea, but any business owner can make changes that
lead to greater sustainability. The carbon footprint plays a key role in climate protection.
Simul8’s CTO argues that intelligently calculating the carbon footprint of each company’s
processes would increase its competitiveness and efficiency, and have a positive impact on
the Earth’s climate.

For example, instead of only passively recording their carbon production, distribution, and
logistics, centres could use simulation models to identify opportunities for improvement
(such as introducing more efficient vehicles, and/or changing their routes). It would thereby
gain the ability to anticipate complications caused by heavy traffic, adverse weather, and the
like, and have the opportunity to adjust the traffic so that fewer vehicles are “idling”, and
therefore producing high carbon emissions.

According to Frances Sneddon, some companies already use simulation and predictive AI to
include the carbon footprint in costs, which allows them to maximize profits, and not neglect
environmental responsibility. F. Sneddon sees an effective, fast, and less “grandiose” way of
combating climate change in supply chain simulations that allow not only to define and
compare delivery routes, delivery times, and vehicle occupancy, but also their carbon footprints.