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#113 Kathryn Dovey & Alex de Vries-Gao: Responsible AI - What You Need to Know

From Responsible Business to Responsible AI: what you need to know and do. Listen to Kathryn Dovey, founder of Recalibrate and ex-OECD & Alex de Vries-Gao, data scientist and researcher at VU Amsterdam

In this episode of Frankly Speaking, Richard Howitt is joined by two leading voices on AI and responsibility to cut through the hype and the fear around artificial intelligence and its environmental impact. From staggering data centre energy figures to algorithmic bias in HR tools, this conversation is essential listening for anyone in a sustainability or responsible business role who is trying to make sense of AI, and what their company should actually be doing about it.

Kathryn Dovey is founder of Recalibrate, working on responsible AI issues. She spent ten years at the OECD Centre for Responsible Business Conduct, including the period in which the OECD AI Principles were agreed.

Alex de Vries-Gao is a data scientist and researcher at the Institute for Environmental Studies at VU Amsterdam, where he has undertaken extensive research on the environmental impact of AI.

You will also hear about:

  • How major US tech companies successfully lobbied the European Commission to keep environmental data from individual data centres out of the public domain
  • The significant positive use cases for AI in sustainability from satellite data analysis tracking climate change and biodiversity, to breakthroughs in healthcare
  • Why the Global South risks bearing the environmental costs of data centres while the benefits flow predominantly to the Global North, and how this echoes patterns seen with large infrastructure projects throughout history
  • The key frameworks companies need to understand: the OECD AI Principles, the OECD Due Diligence Guidance, and the EU AI Act, and why the EU AI Act is a practical benchmark to start working towards now, even as it undergoes its simplification process

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