Artificial intelligence is becoming part of everyday life. It summarizes our emails, answers our questions, writes our messages, and even creates images and videos with a few clicks. Many of these features appear automatically, often without us choosing to use them.
While AI can be a helpful tool, it also comes with an environmental cost that is largely invisible to most of us.
Every AI request requires powerful computers in large data centers to process and generate a response. Those data centers consume enormous amounts of electricity, and generating AI images and videos requires far more energy than a simple text request.
Like many environmental issues, the impact of a single action may seem small. But millions of small actions add up. As AI becomes integrated into more of the services we use every day, our collective energy use grows, even when we don’t realize AI is working in the background.
For people of faith, this raises an important question:
How can we use technology thoughtfully?
Our Unitarian Universalist value of Interdependence reminds us that our choices affect people and ecosystems far beyond what we can see. The electricity powering AI servers, the carbon emissions associated with many data centers, and the growing demand for computing resources all become part of the web of relationships that connects us.
Using less AI doesn’t mean rejecting technology. It means using it intentionally.
Sometimes AI may be the right tool. Other times, a traditional web search, a conversation with a friend, a library visit, or spending a little time figuring something out ourselves may be enough. As one of the guides shared by our Green Sanctuary Team puts it: “The best way to reduce energy is to not consume it. Instead of saying ‘just google it,’ figure it out with a friend.”
If you’d like to reduce the amount of AI built into the services you already use, there are practical steps you can take. Our Green Sanctuary Team has assembled two helpful guides:
- Reasons to Use AI Less explains the environmental impact of AI and why thoughtful use matters.
- Some Ways to Turn Off AI provides instructions for reducing AI features in Gmail and web searches, including options for using DuckDuckGo’s “No AI” search.
No single person can solve the environmental challenges created by rapidly expanding technology. But each of us can make choices that reflect our values.
Whether that means turning off AI summaries, choosing a different search engine, asking a friend instead of a chatbot, or simply pausing to consider whether AI is needed for a particular task, these small decisions can become meaningful acts of environmental stewardship.
Living our values doesn’t always require dramatic action. Sometimes it begins with a simple question:
“Do I really need AI for this?”
