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🗞️ Driving the news: Google DeepMind has unveiled AlphaEarth Foundations, an AI model capable of producing highly detailed, near real-time maps of Earth’s land and coastal waters
• The system integrates trillions of images from diverse sources — including satellites, radar, laser mapping, and climate simulations — to deliver ecosystem data with a resolution of up to 10 m²
• Initial tests from 2017–2024 show it outperformed similar models in land use classification and surface property estimation, reducing error rates by 24%
🔭 The context: For decades, Earth observation has relied on multiple satellites operated by agencies such as NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA)
• While these provide critical data for tracking environmental change, combining heterogeneous datasets has been a technical challenge
• Recent advances in AI have made it possible to fuse and interpret large-scale geospatial data more efficiently, enabling applications in deforestation monitoring, water management, and urban planning
🌍 Why it matters for the planet: AlphaEarth Foundations could significantly accelerate environmental research and policymaking by offering high-resolution, frequently updated global datasets
• Such capabilities can support precision agriculture, disaster preparedness, climate impact assessment, and biodiversity conservation
• However, equitable access, data transparency, and safeguards against misuse will be essential for its responsible application
⏭️ What's next: Google (see sustainability performance) is making AlphaEarth Foundations data available via Google Earth Engine, aiming to expand adoption among scientists, NGOs, and policymakers
• Over 50 organisations — including Brazil’s MapBiomas — are already using it for ecosystem monitoring
• Broader uptake could influence national climate adaptation strategies and international environmental reporting frameworks within the next 2–3 years, especially as AI-driven geospatial tools gain traction in global sustainability initiatives.
💬 One quote: “This gives us new options to make maps that are more accurate, precise and fast to produce, something we would have never been able to do before,” — Tasso Azevedo, founder of MapBiomas
📈 One stat: AlphaEarth Foundations can generate environmental data at a spatial resolution of 10 m², requiring less storage than comparable AI systems while improving accuracy by 24% over existing models
See on illuminem's Data Hub™ the sustainability performance of Google and its peers Microsoft, IBM, and Amazon
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