Designing Ethically Responsible AI Applications for Environmental Sustainability in Google’s Consumer and
Enterprise Ecosystem
Google has long led the way in applying AI to improve products, user experiences, and global systems. As environmental challenges grow more urgent, Google is exploring how emerging AI capabilities—such as multimodal sensing, pattern recognition, and anomaly detection—can be leveraged to advance sustainability across its platforms. Early examples include machine learning for bioacous5c detec5on using Nestcams and AI to iden5fy fugi5ve refrigerant leaks in enterprise HVAC systems. These illustrate AI’s promise in creating measurable environmental benefits while integrating with real-world Google products. This project challenges student researchers to go further: to imagine, prototype, and assess novel AI-powered sustainability features or products that Google might build. However, AI innovation is never purely technical. Every new capability must navigate real tensions—between transparency and proprietary advantage, personalization and privacy, innovation and bias, profit and public interest. Thus, this exploration must be grounded not only in technical feasibility and environmental impact, but in ethical responsibility. Students will engage with real-world tensions that Google teams face every day, using internal principles and tools—such as model cards, fairness audits, and ethical evaluation frameworks—to structure their thinking and recommendations.
How can Google responsibly develop novel AI-powered products and features that materially advance environmental sustainability while balancing ethical tradeoffs around privacy, fairness, transparency, and long-term impact?
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Project Team
- Sarthak Agrawal
- Manas Malviya
- Yueqi Duo
- Dishita Agarwal