 |
|
|
|||||
As Big Tech faces criticism for the environmental impact of artificial intelligence, companies have said the technology will actually help solve climate change. But those claims often lack scientific evidence, a new report finds. And when touting the climate benefits of AI, tech companies conflate traditional AI with the more environmentally harmful generative AI, a form of bait-and-switch that amounts to greenwashing. The report, commissioned by a group of environmental organizations including Beyond Fossil Fuels, Friends of the Earth, and Stand.earth, analyzed 154 statements from tech companies, including those from Google and Microsoft, which purported that AI will have a net climate benefit. Most of those comments relate to traditional AI, the analysis found, which has a smaller environmental footprint than the generative AI tools that are spurring a boom in data centers. Tech companies, however, tend to lump these technologies together, the report says, blurring the differences and presenting the climate benefits and environmental harms as a “package deal. But whether those climate benefits are real is also unclear. Only 26% of those statements cite published academic papers, the research found, and 36% dont cite any evidence at all. Of the remaining statements, 29% cited corporate publicationsthe majority of which did not include peer-reviewed or published academic workand 8% cited media, NGOs, or unpublished academic papers. Questionable AI evidence The rapid expansion of AI has come under fire for its potential environmental harms. Reports on generative AIs climate impact vary, but the tech has been linked to intense energy and water use. Tech companies have justified their AI expansion by pointing to AIs climate benefits. One of the most widespread claims is that AI could help mitigate 5% to 10% of global greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. Google has repeated that statistic, including in its 2024 environmental report. That figure, however, comes from a 2021 blog post by consulting firm BCG which attributes it to the firm’s own experience with clients. This questionable extrapolation of massive global climate benefits justified on seemingly anecdotal evidence was the first clear instance of what has become a longer-term trend of overstating the climate benefits of AI, the report reads. In reality, the International Energy Agency (IEA) projects total data center consumption, driven by AI, will double by 2030and Bloomberg New Energy Finance estimates that this increase will grow total global power sector emissions by 10% over the coming decade. In another example, Googles 2025 environmental report said that rooftop solar power installations assisted by an AI mapping tool would help enable partners to reduce around 6 million metric tons of lifetime GHG emissions. Google also said that figure would be “around 6,000 times greater” than the service’s operation in 2024. But the Beyond Fossil Fuels report says that Google’s footnotes reveal that the 6 million figure is an estimate of the total emissions avoided by rooftop solar because they produce low-emissions energy, not the additional reductions from the AI mapping tool. This detail could create the impression, the report notes, that the climate benefits are attributed to the AI tool. In response to a request for comment, a Google spokesperson told Fast Company that it stood by its methodology, “which is grounded in the best available science. And we are transparent in sharing the principles and methodology that guide it.” (That methodology does not mention AI.) Microsoft, also cited in the report, declined to comment. What even counts as ‘AI’? To many, any mention of AI has become synonymous with generative AIexamples of which include large language models like Claude, ChatGPT, and Copilot, and image or video generating services like Midjourney and Sora. But not all AI is generative. Traditional AI, an umbrella term that covers subsets like machine learning, has been powering all sorts of technology for years, from search engines and recommendation algorithms to medical imaging. Generative AI consumes more energy and is associated with more emissions than traditional AI. When tech companies talk about AIs climate benefits, though, they can conflate the two terms, or position them like a package deal. Most AI climate benefits will come from traditional AI, the report found. In its analysis, the researchers said that at no point did they uncover examples in which consumer generative systems were leading to a material, verifiable, and substantial level of emissions reductions. So climate benefit claims are attributed to traditional AI, but the majority of energy consumption comes from generative AI. The surge in data center demand is largely driven by the exploding demand for generative AI. Those data centers are also directly spurring more natural gas in the U.S. The confusion between these terms matters, the report says, because it amounts to a bait-and-switch type of greenwashing: Tech companies are justifying their data center expansion by touting AIs climate benefits, though most of those data centers will not be processing climate-beneficial computation on their servers. Big Techs AI hype is distracting users from the rapid and dangerous expansion of giant, energy and water-intensive data centers, while the tech industry’s huge energy demands are throwing the fossil fuel industry a lifeline, Jill McArdle, international corporate campaigner from Beyond Fossil Fuels, said in a statement. There is simply no evidence that AI will help the climate more than it will harm it, she added. We cannot bet the climate on these baseless claims.
Category:
E-Commerce
Shares of Fiverr International Ltd. (NYSE: FVRR) are dropping significantly this morning after the freelance marketplace platform reported its Q4 2025 financial results. While the company reported modest revenue growth, its 2026 outlook sent the stock plunging, even as Fiverr executives put a positive spin on the impact of artificial intelligence on its business. Heres what you need to know. Revenue increases, but outlook sends investors fleeing On Wednesday morning, Fiverr reported its fourth-quarter 2025 results. And those results, for the most part, were mixed. The company saw modest growth in total revenue, which rose to $107.2 million in the quartera 3.4% increase from a year earlier. Its revenue actuals fall on the lower end of the $104.3 million to $112.3 million range that the company had projected. However, once you get past the modest revenue growth, you see that Fiverr disappointed on many other key metrics. For example, its marketplace revenue for the quarter was $71.5 million, which was 2.7% lower than the same quarter a year earlier. Perhaps more worrying, and looking out across its entire fiscal 2025, Fiverr reported that its annual active buyers as of December 31 totaled 3.1 million. Thats down from 3.6 million annual active buyers a year earliera decline of half a million buyers, or 13.6% year over year. Interestingly, though, this 13.6% decline in the number of annual active buyers was offset to a large degree by an increase of 13.3% in annual spend per buyer. For the 2025 fiscal year, Fiverr says that the average annual buyer spent $342 compared to the average of $302 they spent in the previous year. What this suggests is that while there were fewer buyers in 2025, they spent more on average than they did in 2024. Yet this mixed bag of results isnt what seems to have sunk Fiverrs stock price this morning. Instead, the main catalyst for Fiverrs stock price decline seems to be its 2026 guidance. For its current Q1 2026, the company says it expects to make between $100 million and $108 million. That would represent a decline of anywhere from 7% to a modest increase of 1%. And for all of fiscal 2026, the company says it expects to make between $380 million and $420 million in revenue, which would represent a decline of anywhere between 12% and 3%. As noted by investing.com, analysts had been expecting Q1 2026 guidance to be around $112.26 million and full-year 2026 guidance to be around $456.80 million. When these expectations werent met, the stock sank. Fiverr shares are currently down nearly 21% in premarket trading as of the time of this writing. AI uncertainty abounds Of course, the elephant in the room for Fiverr investors is artificial intelligence. For over a decade and a half, businesses have turned to Fiverr to source freelancers who could help them carry out projects, from design to coding. But in recent years, those same businesses have begun embracing AI tools for many of those tasks. This has led many investors (and freelancers who sell services on Fiverr) to ponder the platform’s future in a world where AI tools are increasingly commonplace. Fiverr itself didnt say if the rise of these AI tools were the reason for its declining Q1 marketplace revenue, but the company did touch on the topic of AI, attempting to put a somewhat positive spin on it. Address the topic, Fiverr CEO Micha Kaufman said that is was clear that we are living through a significant shift in AI adoption, but he argued that this AI adoption would make humans more essential, not less. By moving toward an agentic economy, where AI helps navigate complexity, we are ensuring that we remain the bridge between businesses and the most exceptional human talent, Kaufman argued. With our expansive global talent network, outcome based hiring model, and depth of proprietary data, Fiverr has a unique right to win in this new age of AI.” Whether or not AI actually has a positive impact on Fiverrs marketplace remains to be seen. It will likely be one of the main points of focus for Fiverr investors in 2026. FVRR has had a horrible 2026 so far As of the time of this writing, FVRR stock is down nearly 21% in premarket trading to $10.79 per share. As of yesterday, the companys stock price had already fallen more than 33% for the year to $13.10. Unfortunately, looking back further doesnt help the companys position. Over the past year, FVRR shares have lost more than 60% of their value as of yesterdays close. Last May, the stock was trading at over $33 per share at one point. During the same 12-month period, the New York Stock Exchange composite index has risen by nearly 6%.
Category:
E-Commerce
The future looks green for Mikes Red Tacos. The San Diego-based taco restaurant currently has only two locations, but it has caught the attention of the restaurant investors who made Daves Hot Chicken a scorching success. This week, the restaurant announced that it has secured franchise development agreements for more than 200 new locations around the country. Mikes Red Tacos was founded as a food truck in 2021 by Mike Touma, followed by a brick-and-mortar location in 2022. The brand is gaining a fast-growing following on social mediaand now it’s primed for nationwide expansion. Fast casual with a taco twist Mikes Red Tacos specializes in birriaa traditional, slow-cooked Mexican stew dish thats typically made from beef, lamb, or goatwhich has exploded in popularity in recent years, largely due to social media trends. It can now be found, in various forms, on menus at numerous Mexican chains, including Taco Bell, Del Taco, and others. Mikes Red Tacos is receiving support from early-stage investors and advisors Bill Phelps and Andrew Feghali. Phelps is executive chairman of Daves Hot Chicken, cofounder of Wetzel’s Pretzels, and a founding investor in Blaze Pizza. He tells Fast Company that very few restaurants catch his eye, but Mikes ticked all the boxes. I love entrepreneur-started businesses, and guys that have figured things out,” Phelps says. “The product is just amazing. Its so good, its like a breakthrough within a category.” He adds that in the strata of Mexican chains, Mikes sits in the fast-casual lane, closer to a chain like Chipotle, rather than a fast-food chain like Taco Bell. Weve learned over the years how to do the model for a fast-casual rollout in the franchise world, so we were able to put a team together very quickly of people we worked with before. ‘There’s a lot of competition’ Phelps says that he first walked into a Mikes Red Tacos around a year ago, and immediately saw the potential. Thats a relatively rare occurrence. Its been once every five years we see something that looks really great and then we go for it, Phelps says. We like founder-created businesses that have incredible quality, but dont know how to scale themthats what we bring to the party. We make a deal that is great for the founder and for us (investors). He knows success isnt guaranteed, of course. You need to leave your ego at the door,” he says. “Theres a lot of competition. A lot of work to do. You need to work your ass off. A lot of that work will fall on Vincent Montanelli, a seasoned industry executive, who was named the companys president. Previously, he held various leadership roles at Wetzels Pretzels. All told, the 200 or so Mikes Red Tacos locations will be spread across 25 markets around the country, including Seattle, Phoenix, Las Vegas, Austin, Dallas, Chicago, Miami, Boston, and other locations around Southern California. The first new location is expected to open in San Diego in March, with a new, corporate-run location opening in Pasadena later this spring.
Category:
E-Commerce
All news |
||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||