Ask HN: Can software engineering help combat climate change?

[codingspot]

As the effects of climate change continue to worsen, it's essential that we explore all possible solutions. One area where technology is making a significant impact is in software engineering and programming. From energy-efficient systems to smart grid technologies and public awareness campaigns, software engineers are using their skills to combat climate change. By leveraging our technical expertise, we can create a more sustainable future for all. Let's discuss how technology can help mitigate the effects of climate change and what we can do to promote sustainability.

[friend_and_foe]

No.

It's lipstick on a pig, it's a way of feeling important while making no difference. The way you combat climate change is by reducing carbon dioxide output and increasing biomass creation and therefore uptake and sinking. You can't write code that does that.

Adding complexity to everything is what software developers do best, only the most skilled ones manage to reduce complexity, and adding complexity to this situation isn't going to help anyone. Don't stick your fingers in the pie, this one's not for you unless you want to build some different skills.

[thebenedict]

There's plenty of greenwashing in tech, but I don't think it's hopeless. On an ops call this morning I heard about a team switching to a server type that saves ~40% on power, and their fleet is ~50k instances. Opportunities exist if you have the skills and this is an issue you care about.

[juancn]

Well you could be efficient with your code so it doesn't waste CPU cycles, since CPU cycles == Energy, and if your algorithms use less energy, in all likelihood you'll emit less CO2. Specially if they're widely deployed.

[wnkrshm]

There are some endeavours I feel that could have an impact, but it's always a clever protocol in combination with the right hardware, like solar-powered mesh-networks or just solar-powered servers with 24h availability due to mirrors on the other side of the planet [0].

[0] https://www.dezeen.com/2022/09/27/solar-protocol-network-exp...

Edit: What I want to say is, that the good that is possible is mostly small tech, not big tech.

[bfung]

stop running servers computing hashes that don't contribute to society? btc cough /s

I used to work for a tech company that used big data to convince large swaths of people to become energy efficient. One of the company metrics was how much energy was saved, accounting for our footprint as well; it was fun and gratifying when we crossed the saved more than 1TWh threshold, which also reduced the need for fossil fuel peaker plants. So these companies do exist, but the tech isn't sexy nor complex/hard/challenging ~ way more of a business and social component to these systems, and tech is only a small tool here.

Said company was acquired by Oracle and still running and doing well!

* https://www.oracle.com/industries/utilities/products/opower-...

* https://www.cnbc.com/2022/07/14/how-opower-sold-to-oracle-ha...

[Glench]

Economically-speaking, in the next decade we'll need to deploy a massive amount of electric replacements for fossil-burning things, about a billion machines in total. So heat pumps, electric cars, induction stoves, electric bikes, electric panels on houses, new solar/wind farms, distribution lines, etc. This is the primary way we get emissions reductions at scale. All the manufacturers and contractors making and installing this stuff will need software to support them.

You might ask Saul Griffith (https://twitter.com/GriffithSaul/) for more details. He really has his finger on the pulse of the engineering needed and is one of the main people that got the US IRA climate bill to pass.

[mynegation]

I liked a write up from Bret Victor on this: http://worrydream.com/ClimateChange/

[sfa_aok]

Thanks for sharing this, I've added it to my reading list.

OP, this article also came to mind which you may find useful: https://nanransohoff.substack.com/p/finding-a-job-in-climate

[ridiculous_fish]

The nuclear industry, in which I work, has a large set of software components for modeling reactors. Engineers who work on these components make nuclear reactors faster to design, simulate them with more accuracy, etc. https://mooseframework.inl.gov is an example.

[csh0]

Directly, probably not.

I will try to come up with a few examples anyway, in no particular order:

1. You could write software which improves the efficacy of an organization who is working on climate related problems.

2. Low level optimizations in algorithms could conceivably result in reduced processing resources expended when executed billions or trillions of times (though realistically all that will happen is more stuff will be processed)

3. Stepping away from software engineering specifically and looking toward electrical engineering, you could make sizeable contributions to reducing emissions by working on “green” computing architectures. This one is sort of like 2 in that very small improvements in TDP on CPUs add up substantially. I had a professor who worked on this sort of thing.

[doitLP]

The problem with climate change is the amount you are likely to do will be very small. Go find areas you can contribute to that are both 1) tractable (ie you can actually do something about them) and 2) neglected (so your impact will be much bigger than non-neglected things)

Climate change is neither of those things. You might be able to find a niche aspect of it that is, in which case go for it! Otherwise check coo it the job board at 80000hours.org for jobs that fall under 1 & 2 above: https://jobs.80000hours.org/?refinementList%5Btags_role_type...

[pcthrowaway]

Until last year, the Ethereum network used about as much energy as the Philippines (#33 on this list https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_electrici...)

Through the coordination of hundreds software engineers over the course of roughly 7 years, they made fundamental changes to the consensus protocol, such that it now falls somewhere at the very end of that list.

Now of course, software engineers also caused the problem in the first place, so make of that what you will

[BjoernKW]

The most immediate - yet mostly overlooked - positive impact software and software engineering has on combating climate change is anything that enables remote work or that does away with pointless busywork through automation.

It never ceases to amaze that hardly anyone seems to even want to talk about the daily commute as one of the main reasons for climate change.

Ultimately, it doesn't matter if you're using an EV, a combustion engine, or even public transport to get to office every day. Not having to commute at all is what can make a difference, though.

[defrost]

What's the current state of free, highly accurate, highly referenced, whole earth models of energy and resource usage aimed at the bright early high schooler and above demographic?

One of the biggest challenges to reaching climate change is to globally educate in a transparent manner, identify the highest per capita contibutor and consumption demographics, promote suggestions for change, identify BS carbon credit trading schemes, identify effective C02 capture and reduction strategies, etc.

If I want to get a neice the best available SimEarth (for reals) what are the current options?

[mstaoru]

I work in an IoT startup that is upgrading commercial HVAC to support smarter energy management. It's shockingly easy to save 10-20, sometimes up to 50% energy just by scheduling and occupancy-based control. All these huge, empty, cold rooms in the malls and office buildings are wasting a lot. Commercial buildings are contributing up to 40% of all greenhouse emissions, so if we reduce that by 20%, that's already a 8% global win. It is software + hardware though.

[defrost]

> Commercial buildings are contributing up to 40% of all greenhouse emissions

Is this a number you can reliably back?

(The hard 40% part, "up to 40%" includes "only 5%" of course)

At face value it doesn't appear to mesh with, for example:

https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/sources-greenhouse-gas-emis...

[codingspot]

very interesting!

[linseed_213]

Spent some time with technical friends working in the space, and it's unlikely.

However, Climate Draft [1] spends a lot of effort to find high potential startups with technical hiring challenges.

[1] https://www.climatedraft.org/

[DasCorCor]

All the negative nelsons aside, AI for materials science comes to mind. Better carbon capture, batteries, solar panels. I imagine nuclear reactors require pretty significant control systems. How easy is it to permit all of the power plants we will need? I bet software could help there.

[juancn]

If you care, just don't waste CPU cycles if possible. Efficient code is green code in the sense that it's more likely not to waste energy.

Things like bitcoin with their proof of work algorithms, are borderline immoral. Just burning through and awful lot of energy for no good reason.

[CapstanRoller]

The most impactful thing is to Stop Doing Things.

This does not mean nihilism or acceptance of the status quo, it just means that we cannot produce our way out of this mess.

I am typing this after staying up all night in a suburban area by an arterial road -- the world is beautifully quiet at 3:00AM. The magic didn't last long, because a mere hour later I started hearing whispers of a waking world. It's now 4:30AM and there's a steadily increasing whoosh of tires and a growing cacophony of revving engines. All these people are rapidly going somewhere, but why? Is it really necessary?

The answer is not more EVs or more bike lanes or whatever, but rather less of everything aka degrowth.

Stop Doing Things and encourage others to adopt this mindset as well.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Degrowth

[BjoernKW]

"Degrowth" aka "Malthusianism 2.0" is a synonym for depopulation and / or decreased standard of living.

Even the current number of humans alive - let alone people yet to be born - can't be maintained without continued growth, innovation, and the paradigm shifts resulting from that innovation and growth.

Anyone trying to make the argument for degrowth therefore ultimately has to decide which humans deserve to be born or who gets to have a standard of living comparable to the one common in developed economies today.

[Brajeshwar]

Software Engineering definitely plays a big part. It can be seen as the ways to build the tools to augment the actions, automate processes, and help in building tools to remove CO2e (Carbon Dioxide equivalent).

However, thinking in terms of what IDE settings, configs, etc. and the act of software engineering with regards to Climate Change is too minuscule an impact that it may not have the desired effect.

For instance, in 2018, I help build a functioning aeroponics farm right in the middle of the city and supplied produce to some local eateries to test/experiment on our hypothesis. The entire operation ran on a single Raspberry Pi and the nutrient feed timing and feeding was automated. That is software engineering helping as a tool.

Yes, we can use Software Engineering as one of the key means to our end goal and do have big role to play which can have an outsized return in fighting climate change.

[jytechdevops]

I don't know the details but I know the one of the original Reddit founders @Yishan has a company that does something with climate change. Terraformation. might be worth checking out. good lukc on your search.

[energyguy78]

You can use AI or ML to train the electric grids to work more efficiently, if you don't it is just guess work with the deregulated market

[kevintb]

Sure. Zoom has enabled millions of people to work remotely and not commute.