<p><a href="https://www.weforum.org/events/annual-meeting-of-the-global-future-councils-2017">This article is part of the Annual Meeting of the Global Future Councils</a>.</p>
<p><i>For more information watch the <a href="https://www.weforum.org/events/world-economic-forum-annual-meeting-2017/sessions/what-if-privacy-becomes-a-luxury-good-davos-2017">What If: Privacy Becomes a Luxury Good? session</a> from the World Economic Forum&#8217;s Annual Meeting 2017.</i></p>
<p>Welcome to the year 2030. Welcome to my city &#8211; or should I say, &#8220;our city&#8221;. I don&#8217;t own anything. I don&#8217;t own a car. I don&#8217;t own a house. I don&#8217;t own any appliances or any clothes.</p>
<p>It might seem odd to you, but it makes perfect sense for us in this city. Everything you considered a product, has now become a service. We have access to transportation, accommodation, food and all the things we need in our daily lives. One by one all these things became free, so it ended up not making sense for us to own much.</p>
<p>First communication became digitized and free to everyone. Then, when clean energy became free, things started to move quickly. Transportation dropped dramatically in price. It made no sense for us to own cars anymore, because we could call a driverless vehicle or a flying car for longer journeys within minutes. We started transporting ourselves in a much more organized and coordinated way when public transport became easier, quicker and more convenient than the car. Now I can hardly believe that we accepted congestion and traffic jams, not to mention the air pollution from combustion engines. What were we thinking?</p>
<p><img class="aligncenter" src="https://assets.weforum.org/editor/ygNQMDsjtnoU0sCDwWcvoa20HvcyA1zie8u8IKu44tU.jpg" alt=" A yellow bicycle. Bicycles could be a primary form of transport in our future society." width="600" height="397" /></p>
<p>Sometimes I use my bike when I go to see some of my friends. I enjoy the exercise and the ride. It kind of gets the soul to come along on the journey. Funny how some things seem never seem to lose their excitement: walking, biking, cooking, drawing and growing plants. It makes perfect sense and reminds us of how our culture emerged out of a close relationship with nature.</p>
<h2>&#8220;Environmental problems seem far away&#8221;</h2>
<p>In our city we don&#8217;t pay any rent, because someone else is using our free space whenever we do not need it. My living room is used for business meetings when I am not there.</p>
<p>Once in awhile, I will choose to cook for myself. It is easy &#8211; the necessary kitchen equipment is delivered at my door within minutes. Since transport became free, we stopped having all those things stuffed into our home. Why keep a pasta-maker and a crepe cooker crammed into our cupboards? We can just order them when we need them.</p>
<p>This also made the breakthrough of the circular economy easier. When products are turned into services, no one has an interest in things with a short life span. Everything is designed for durability, repairability and recyclability. The materials are flowing more quickly in our economy and can be transformed to new products pretty easily. Environmental problems seem far away, since we only use clean energy and clean production methods. The air is clean, the water is clean and nobody would dare to touch the protected areas of nature because they constitute such value to our well being. In the cities we have plenty of green space and plants and trees all over. I still do not understand why in the past we filled all free spots in the city with concrete.</p>
<h2>The death of shopping</h2>
<p>Shopping? I can&#8217;t really remember what that is. For most of us, it has been turned into choosing things to use. Sometimes I find this fun, and sometimes I just want the algorithm to do it for me. It knows my taste better than I do by now.</p>
<p>When AI and robots took over so much of our work, we suddenly had time to eat well, sleep well and spend time with other people. The concept of rush hour makes no sense anymore, since the work that we do can be done at any time. I don&#8217;t really know if I would call it work anymore. It is more like thinking-time, creation-time and development-time.</p>
<p>For a while, everything was turned into entertainment and people did not want to bother themselves with difficult issues. It was only at the last minute that we found out how to use all these new technologies for better purposes than just killing time.</p>
<h2>&#8220;They live different kinds of lives outside of the city&#8221;</h2>
<p>My biggest concern is all the people who do not live in our city. Those we lost on the way. Those who decided that it became too much, all this technology. Those who felt obsolete and useless when robots and AI took over big parts of our jobs. Those who got upset with the political system and turned against it. They live different kind of lives outside of the city. Some have formed little self-supplying communities. Others just stayed in the empty and abandoned houses in small 19th century villages.</p>
<p>Once in awhile I get annoyed about the fact that I have no real privacy. No where I can go and not be registered. I know that, somewhere, everything I do, think and dream of is recorded. I just hope that nobody will use it against me.</p>
<p>All in all, it is a good life. Much better than the path we were on, where it became so clear that we could not continue with the same model of growth. We had all these terrible things happening: lifestyle diseases, climate change, the refugee crisis, environmental degradation, completely congested cities, water pollution, air pollution, social unrest and unemployment. We lost way too many people before we realised that we could do things differently.</p>
<p><i><b>Author&#8217;s note:</b> Some people have read this blog as my utopia or dream of the future. It is not. It is a scenario showing where we could be heading &#8211; for better and for worse. I wrote this piece to start a discussion about some of the pros and cons of the current technological development. When we are dealing with the future, it is not enough to work with reports. We should start discussions in many new ways. This is the intention with this piece.</i></p>
<p>Written by Ida Auken, Member of Parliament, Parliament of Denmark (Folketinget)</p>


Welcome to 2030. I own nothing, have no privacy, and life has never been better

Future Society

Our future society will look very different than what we know today. Ida Auken, Danish Member of Parliament, predicts living without possessions or privacy.

Welcome to 2030. I Own Nothing, Have No Privacy, and Life Has Never Been Better

It's where we could be heading — for better and for worse.

<h2>India&#8217;s Electric Future</h2>
<p>Every car sold in India from 2030 will be electric, under new government plans that have delighted environmentalists and dismayed the oil industry.</p>
<p>It’s hoped that by ridding India’s roads of petrol and diesel cars in the years ahead, the country will be able to reduce the harmful levels of air pollution that contribute to a staggering <a href="https://secured-static.greenpeace.org/india/Global/india/Airpoclypse--Not-just-Delhi--Air-in-most-Indian-cities-hazardous--Greenpeace-report.pdf">1.2 million deaths per year</a>.</p>
<p>India’s booming economy has seen it become the world’s third-largest oil importer, <a href="https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2017/05/indias-revolutionary-plan-to-make-all-its-cars-electric/526695/">shelling out $150 billion annually for the resource</a> – so a switch to electric-powered vehicles would put a sizable dent in demand for oil. It’s been calculated that the revolutionary move would <a href="https://www.rmi.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/NITI_RMI_India_Report_2017.pdf">save the country $60 billion in energy costs by 2030</a>, while also reducing running costs for millions of Indian car owners.</p>
<figure class="st__content-block st__content-block--image"></figure>
<p>India’s Energy Minister Piyush Goyal says the <a href="http://www.ibtimes.co.in/watch-india-unveils-ambitious-plan-have-only-electric-cars-by-2030-724887">government will financially support the initiative</a> for the first two or three years, but the production of electric vehicles will be “driven by demand and not subsidy” after that.</p>
<figure style="width: 640px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img src="https://wp-assets.futurism.com/2017/06/27731159582_6f158f47df_z.jpg" alt="India Will Sell Only Electric Cars Within the Next 13 Years" width="640" height="480" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Veeresh Malik/Flickr</figcaption></figure>
<figure class="st__content-block st__content-block--image"></figure>
<h2>Air Pollution a Big Problem in India</h2>
<p>More than a million people die in India every year as a result of breathing in toxic fumes, with <a href="https://secured-static.greenpeace.org/india/Global/india/Airpoclypse--Not-just-Delhi--Air-in-most-Indian-cities-hazardous--Greenpeace-report.pdf">an investigation by Greenpeace</a> finding that the number of deaths caused by air pollution is only a fraction less than the number of smoking-related deaths.</p>
<p>The investigation also found that 3% of the country&#8217;s gross domestic product was lost due to the levels of toxic smog.</p>
<p>In 2014, the World Health Organization <a href="http://www.economist.com/news/asia/21642224-air-indians-breathe-dangerously-toxic-breathe-uneasy">determined</a> that out of the 20 global cities with the most air pollution, 13 are in India.</p>
<p>Efforts have been made by the country’s leaders to to improve air quality, with one example coming in January 2016 when New Delhi’s government <a href="http://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2016/01/11/462307304/can-oddeven-curb-delhi-pollution-heres-what-locals-are-tweeting">mandated</a>that men could only drive their cars on alternate days depending on whether their registration plate ended with an odd or even number (single women were permitted to drive every day).</p>
<p>While such interventions have enjoyed modest success, switching to a fleet of purely electric cars would have a much greater environmental impact.</p>
<p>Indeed, it’s been calculated that the gradual switch to electric vehicles across India <a href="https://www.rmi.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/NITI_RMI_India_Report_2017.pdf">would decrease carbon emissions by 37% by 2030</a>.</p>
<h2><b>Oil Firms Facing Uncertain Future</b></h2>
<p>As India’s ambitious electric vehicle plans begin to take shape, oil exporters will be frantically revising their calculations for oil demand in the region.</p>
<p>In its report into <a href="http://www.bp.com/en/global/corporate/energy-economics/energy-outlook/electric-cars-and-oil-demand.html">the impact of electric cars on oil demand</a>, oil and gas giant BP forecast that the global fleet of petrol and diesel cars would almost double from about 900 million in 2015 to 1.7 billion by 2035.</p>
<figure class="st__content-block st__content-block--image"></figure>
<figure class="st__content-block st__content-block--image"></figure>
<p>Almost 90% of that growth was estimated to come from countries that are not members of the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development), such as India and China.</p>
<p>China is also gearing up for a move away from gas-guzzling cars.</p>
<p>Last month, the Chinese confirmed they intend to push ahead with plans that will see alternative fuel vehicles <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-gasoline-asia-demand-analysis-idUSKBN1880BH">account for at least one-fifth of the 35 million annual vehicle sales projected, by 2025</a>.</p>
<p>Oil bosses claim it’s too early to tell what the implications of a move away from petrol and diesel cars will be. However, Asia has long been the main driver of future oil demand and so developments in India and China will be watched extremely closely.</p>


Advanced Transport

To help battle air pollution the Indian government is instituting a plan to help get fossil fuel powered vehicles off the road.

India Will Sell Only Electric Cars Within the Next 13 Years

Carbon emissions will be slashed by 37%.

<h2>Crowdfunding the Future</h2>
<p>The rise of the internet and the ubiquity of mobile computing devices have changed everything from travel and shopping to politics – think Uber, Amazon, and Twitter. <figure style="width: 360px" class="wp-caption alignright"><a href="https://futurism.com/images/cubesats-latest-evolution-space-exploration/"><img src="https://wp-assets.futurism.com/2016/03/cubesat_home_v1.jpg" alt="CubeSats: The Latest Evolution in Space Exploration" ></a><figcaption class="wp-caption-text center"><strong><a href="https://futurism.com/images/cubesats-latest-evolution-space-exploration/" target="_blank">Click to View Full Infographic</a></figcaption></strong></figure></p>
<p>But for the next revolution in commerce, governance and social interaction we need to look up – about 100 miles up, into the low Earth orbit. There, falling prices for communication and earth monitoring satellites, along with blockchain-enabled security, will make everything from broadband communication to crop monitoring available not just to technology elites, but to the most remote farm, village or machine.</p>
<p>This sharing economy in space could give even those not employed by large corporations or governments access to real-time, trustworthy data about everything from weather patterns and economic outlooks to cross-border migrations.</p>
<p>By democratizing access to space-based resources, we can create a more humane and just world. But realizing these benefits requires overcoming complex technical, legal, political and regulatory challenges. It also means genuinely caring about, and addressing, the suspicions of those who, in an increasingly nationalistic and fearful world, will bridle at anonymous, crowdfunded satellites looking over their shoulders.</p>
<h2>The Democratization of Space</h2>
<p>Multiple technical advances are creating the infrastructure for the sharing economy in space.</p>
<p>First, and most obvious, is a wave of start-ups driving dramatic and ongoing reductions in launch costs with innovations such as<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-03-08/spacex-reflying-rocket-this-month-in-step-toward-cheap-launches"> reusable boosters</a>. The second is the development of <a href="http://www.satellitetoday.com/nextspace/2016/12/16/else-ceo-2017-big-year-planned-64-satellite-constellation/">nano sats</a> that are dramatically smaller, lighter and less expensive to build and launch than those typically used by governments or industry. These satellites use common standards and off-the-shelf parts, transforming satellite manufacturing from crafting one-off designs to the mass assembly of standard products.</p>
<p>The use of software-defined components, which can be updated with new capabilities and new techniques for speedier development of custom sensors, further slashes the cost and time required to provide new space-based services. The increasing intelligence of satellites and the communication bandwidth between them will allow them to operate as autonomous swarms, allocating monitoring or signal relay work to the satellite that can do it most efficiently. Finally, all these advances mean more and more space-based sensing and connectivity services with continual increases in image resolution and the area satellites can cover at a lower cost.</p>
<p>From satellite constellations to Mother Earth&#8217;s 24&#215;7 digital twin</p>
<h2>Now, Add Blockchain</h2>
<p>However, community or civic organizations must know the data they receive is reliable and that their ownership stake in a satellite (or the service it provides) is secure and they will get proper payment. The low-cost, distributed trust provided by the blockchain distributed ledger provides these assurances through a series of decentral and encrypted technologies provided by the Next Generation Internet.</p>
<p>Blockchain-enabled “smart contracts” can also allow satellites and systems that need their services to autonomously negotiate and complete transactions based on predetermined criteria such as the price a customer is willing to pay for a certain image and how quickly they need it. Users, satellite owners and even the satellites themselves could dynamically create new services to pay for their launching, insurance, and other costs.</p>
<p>Ideally, a “digital twin” of earth – the sum total of all real-time data about everything from endangered biospheres to animal migrations and air pollution – could be analyzed by artificial intelligence algorithms to identify threats to the integrity of the earth and trigger countermeasures.</p>
<h2>A Sharing Economy in Space</h2>
<p>A<a href="https://medium.com/@cstoecker/space-based-digital-twin-of-earth-brings-affordable-insights-and-web-connectivity-to-the-other-83428572b92a#.g6yfec22s"> sharing economy in space</a> means the distributed ownership of space assets and the data and communication services they produce. In this economy, satellites and their “products” would not only be owned by for-profit entities and governments, but by non-profit community groups, NGOs and individuals. They could even be “self-owned” by the assets.</p>
<p>This new economic model could provide much more accessible, faster and lower cost remote sensor data, as well as low-cost universal broadband communications for previously underserved areas and remote machines.</p>
<p>These capabilities could be used for everything from increasing business efficiency to reducing pollution and crime and empowering local and non-profit organizations to protect the earth or their local communities. They also pave the way for new granular, decentralized markets for the rental, lending, and sharing of satellites.</p>
<p>It’s not too hard to imagine the benefits, which range from improved tracking of transit, weather and traffic conditions to more accurate economic forecasting – think tracking the number of cars at shopping centers, as indicators of consumer confidence or the location of oil tankers and rail cars to monitor economic output. Humanitarian organizations could better target relief efforts and even remote villages could fund their own broadband communications or track illegal logging.</p>
<h2>Not So Fast</h2>
<p>Like any major change, this sharing economy in space faces major legal, regulatory and technical hurdles. They range from determining who owns the information and analytics to providing opt outs for those who don’t want satellite data about their property recorded. It will also require mechanisms to track and control satellites to prevent their being used for criminal or terrorist purposes, as well as finding ways to safely destroy failed satellites so they don’t cause damage to other satellites or space vehicles.</p>
<p>Then there is the question of how these decentralized, cryptographically secure eyes in the sky will look to those who feel left behind by globalization and economic, social and technological trends. It is all too easy to imagine how a sharing economy in space could be seen as just another top-down, utopian vision that helps urban elites at the expense of poorer, rural or economically-depressed areas.</p>
<p>Fighting this perception requires work to make sure it does not become a reality. The onus is on business and government leaders to proactively and aggressively ensure that the sharing economy in space genuinely helps everyone, regardless of where they live, their social class, political orientation or level of formal education. Such benefits for those who feel left behind range from: broadband access that gives remote users entry to the global economy; faster access to climate, market and pricing trends that can help farmers negotiate with middlemen; and even locally-controlled monitoring of national borders to defuse fears of mass illegal migration.</p>
<p>Now is the time to begin detailed discussions about issues such as:</p>
<ul>
<li>How to regulate this infrastructure to prevent its misuse without stifling innovation.</li>
<li>When and how to eliminate barriers to nano sats, such as high license fees and other funding/capital requirements, as well as requirements that operators provide indemnity against damages beyond that provided by a launch partner.</li>
<li>What types of funding (crowdfunding, private investment, government subsidies) should be encouraged to stimulate development of the sharing economy in space.</li>
<li>Who should own the data, and the resulting analysis, and how to balance private ownership of the data one group has paid for against its value to the public.</li>
<li>Whether and how this data, services, and transactions should be taxed and which tax authority should receive the revenue.</li>
</ul>
<h2>Building the Future Now</h2>
<p>The future of space may not evolve as we’ve predicted here. As with the internet, humans have found unexpected ways to use new technology and the dangerous side effects – such as the polarization of society through self-reinforcing interactions on social media – often take tech visionaries by surprise.</p>
<p>But the basic technologies, from falling costs for space-based communications and sensor data to blockchain-enabled smart contracts, are maturing rapidly. Together, they will create an internet-like, standard, scalable and low-cost platform on which innovators can build radically new businesses and social models. Realizing the potential benefits – and spreading them beyond the traditional capitalist stakeholders and urban elites to wider society – will require close attention to technical, legal, security, ownership, privacy and equity issues.</p>
<p>Tackling these issues proactively will help prevent the inevitable unexpected consequences that could threaten the game-changing benefits of a truly shared economy in space.</p>


Off World

Sending satellites into space is going to continue to get cheaper since SpaceX proved it could reliably launch refurbished rockets.

The Future May Owe Itself to Blockchain Technology. Here’s Why.

We could see a complete revamp of the world's economy.

<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p><i>Space technologies will one day take us to asteroids, Mars and back to the moon, and the impact of these missions will be felt back on Earth, says </i><i>George Whitesides, Chief Executive Officer at Virgin Galactic and co-chair of the Global Future Council on Space Technologies. In this interview, he </i><i>explains how the latest developments in space technologies will help bring about revolutions in wifi access, travel and beyond.</i></p>
<h2><b>What is the State of Space Technology Today?</b></h2>
<p>We are at an exciting moment. What we see are several converging trends that will change how we approach space technologies, at a rate of innovation that we haven’t seen in a long time.<figure style="width: 360px" class="wp-caption alignright"><a href="https://futurism.com/images/invaders-from-earth-how-elon-musk-plans-to-conquer-mars/"><img src="https://wp-assets.futurism.com/2016/11/Homepage-Thumbnail-3.jpg" alt="Invaders From Earth!: How Elon Musk Plans to Conquer Mars" ></a><figcaption class="wp-caption-text center"><strong><a href="https://futurism.com/images/invaders-from-earth-how-elon-musk-plans-to-conquer-mars/" target="_blank">Click to View Full Infographic</a></figcaption></strong></figure></p>
<p>The power of miniaturization, for example, is having a huge impact on satellites. It’s becoming easier to put more capabilities into smaller packages. Constellations of small satellites are allowing for both new capabilities as well as existing capabilities at much lower costs.</p>
<p>The exploration of space is also becoming global. More nations are now within reach of space than ever before, while the influx of entrepreneurial capital is driving innovation and new technologies in the private sector.</p>
<p>What excites me most about space technologies is that it&#8217;s an opportunity for us to put the best of humanity forward into the future. It enables international cooperation, courage, boldness and entrepreneurship. We are doing things for the benefit for the planet.</p>
<p>We live on the spaceship Earth. Space technologies help us understand our mothership. The climate, peace and security, energy issues: these are all things space technologies can play a key role in.</p>
<p>How Will Your Global Future Council Be Contributing to the Conversation?</p>
<p>We have a very impressive group of people from around the globe and a diversity of professions.</p>
<p>We will certainly want to look at how we make space exploration sustainable, for business, government and science. We need to ensure the long-term sustainability of the space environment. It’s particularly important now with so many new actors coming into the field.</p>
<p>We will also be looking at how we should react to trends such as space property rights and space debris.</p>
<h2>What Are the Challenges for Sustainability in Space?</h2>
<p>The issue of sustainability in space is really crucial. When we talk about sustainability in space, there are a variety of issues.</p>
<p>There is no nationally owned sector of space. It’s all shared, so the responsibility is global. This is the same thing here on Earth, when you look at international waters. The pollution in our waters is an international problem. In space, we have a growing amount of debris that comes from old satellites, launch vehicle stages, collisions and so on. It is very hard to clean up areas of space that have been filled with debris.</p>
<p>Radio frequency is another shared resource which is actually being handled rather well right now, but it will continue to be something we need to pay attention to.</p>
<figure style="width: 1024px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img src="https://wp-assets.futurism.com/2017/03/26041477860_369af0f483_b.jpg" alt="" width="1024" height="693" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Steve Jurvetson/Flickr</figcaption></figure>
<h2>What Other Key Trends Should We Be Aware Of?</h2>
<p>A lot of people are looking at launch vehicles and reusability. Right now we don’t use space launch vehicles very efficiently. Imagine if we threw away an airplane after every flight. That’s how space flight works today. These are amazing, precision engineered vehicles and we essentially throw them away after one use. The prospect of getting better reusable vehicles could reduce costs substantially and have a dramatic impact on increasing space access.</p>
<p>Small vehicles are also showing enormous potential. Those are being tailored to smaller satellites. This all leads to what we call &#8220;disaggregation&#8221;, or the idea that you can accomplish certain goals in space technologies in multiple small units rather than in a single large one. GPS is a good example of this.</p>
<p>Multiple small satellites also reduce the chance of failure. By simple numbers, if one satellite goes down, the system is not significantly affected as a whole.</p>
<p>Many companies are seeking to provide global communications and broadband via space, and this approach to constellations of small satellites is going to help make that possible.</p>
<h2>Where Do You Think We’ll Be by 2030?</h2>
<p>The perspective of space is truly important to the future of our planet. Before we can act on any particular policy, it is helpful to shift our worldview to a planetary perspective. It’s a crucial element in solving the challenges facing us.</p>
<p>You&#8217;ll see vehicles taking people into space, but also on high-speed journeys around the planet. We might be making our first human journeys to Mars, to an asteroid and possibly a return to the moon.</p>
<p>Back here on Earth we will see benefits ranging from a better understanding of the climate to ubiquitous broadband. Global access to broadband would bring billions into the global economy, spurring development.</p>
<p>Space science will continue to make great advances. Finding new planets around other stars, perhaps showing signs of organic material, and also identifying other resources in our solar system are very possible. Perhaps, by then, we may even have found signs of actual life outside our planet.</p>
</div>


Sci-Fi Visions

The future of space travel is of paramount importance to the enrichment of the human race. The technology developed could also benefit us here at home.

Where Will Space Tech Take Us by 2030?

Some of these advances will improve your life here on Earth, too.

<div class="article-body">
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>The idea of traveling around town in a self-driving car has captured the world&#8217;s imagination. In addition to promising a more relaxed commute, <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/how-driverless-cars-will-change-lives-2016-12?utm_source=feedly&amp;utm_medium=webfeeds&amp;r=US&amp;IR=T/#people-will-stop-owning-cars-3">autonomous driving is regarded as a solution</a> to everything from traffic congestion and lack of parking spaces to accident prevention and reduced carbon emissions.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>But how realistic is our vision of the car of the future?</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<h2>Step-By-Step Toward Autonomous Driving</h2>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Modern cars already have a lot of assistance systems which anticipate the kinds of features self-driving vehicles will have: dashboard cameras, lane departure warning, blind spot detection, collision prevention, rain sensors, automated parking and real-time routing.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p><a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-12-13/car-to-car-talking-may-be-mandated-to-cut-u-s-crashes-deaths">The US Department of Transport has recently announced plans</a> to require cars to stream movement data and monitor other vehicles to avoid crashes. To achieve this, vehicle-to-vehicle communication systems will interact with other driver assistance systems such as automatic braking. They could become mandatory within four years and help reduce the 35,000 deaths a year in road traffic accidents throughout the US.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Google and <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2016/12/20/ubers-self-driving-cars-labelled-not-ready-streets-found-cut/">Uber</a> are among the companies which have sought a high profile for their self-driving vehicles tests, but have hit safety issues in the process. Uber recently found itself at loggerheads with cyclists in California. It emerged that Uber’s autonomous test vehicles could not deal with turning safely across bike lanes, potentially endangering cyclists. Uber spokeswoman Chelsea Kohler told the Guardian in an email that “engineers are continuing to work on the problem”, and said that the company has instructed drivers to take control when approaching right turns on a street with a bike lane.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>In spite of the setbacks experienced by these pioneers, most of the world’s biggest car makers – Ford, Nissan, Honda, Daimler, Peugeot, and Hyundai, to name a few – are working on autonomous vehicles that they expect to hit our roads over the next few years. In China, Baidu also has plans for autonomous vehicles.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Tesla is among the most advanced. Tesla cars already in production come with an array of cameras, sensors, and software <a href="https://www.technologyreview.com/s/600772/10-breakthrough-technologies-2016-tesla-autopilot/">enabling them to operate in ‘Autopilot’ mode</a>. However, to date, you can only do so in the right conditions – clearly marked lanes, a relatively constant speed and a map of the area you’re traveling through. That said, Tesla has announced plans to have <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/the-18-driverless-car-breakthroughs-2030-2016-12?utm_source=feedly&amp;utm_medium=webfeeds&amp;r=US&amp;IR=T">a car self-drive from Los Angeles to New York by the end of 2017</a>.</p>
<p><img src="https://wp-assets.futurism.com/2017/03/3249100751_c208620f20_b.jpg" alt="" /></p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<h2><b>Supercomputers on Wheels</b></h2>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p><a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/the-18-driverless-car-breakthroughs-2030-2016-12?utm_source=feedly&amp;utm_medium=webfeeds&amp;r=US&amp;IR=T">Business Insider estimates</a> that by 2020, 10 million self-driving cars will be on the road. However, a lot of development still needs to happen.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Maps are key to the success of automated driving. A report in <a href="http://www.popularmechanics.com/cars/a21609/here-maps-future-of-self-driving-cars/">Popular Mechanics</a> recently quoted an expert saying that while you could base self-driving entirely on visual and sensor cues, this approach would become difficult when rain or snow reduced the visibility of curbs and road markings. Therefore, the magazine concluded, there was industry consensus “that maps will make or break the age of self-driving cars.”</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Compared to maps for existing satellite navigation systems, autonomous driving requires a much deeper level of information about the road network. <a href="https://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.trustedreviews.com%2Fnews%2Fnvidia-and-tomtom-team-up-to-map-driverless-car-future%23i9qZfbHsBrqgS0ai.99">Mapping experts at TomTom</a> are working on highly detailed maps to address this. They will reflect a complete, three-dimensional model of the road, including the road profile, curvature, and terrain.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Self-driving cars will use Artificial Intelligence (AI) to combine data from different sources – built-in sensors, cameras, road signs, traffic and weather information &#8211; to assess their environment, learn and make decisions on what to do next. To achieve this, large amounts of data will need to be processed on board, in real time, so the car can adapt to the driving situation as needed. <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/aarontilley/2016/08/22/nvidia-unveils-new-processor-for-its-self-driving-car-supercomputer/#1d2f3fbd6339">Chip makers including NVIDIA and Intel are focusing their research and development on providing the required processing ‘horsepower,’</a> which has been compared to creating a moving supercomputer.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<h2><b>Regulators are Stepping in</b></h2>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Then there is the design of these cars. When Google started its self-driving initiative – one of the first companies to do so &#8211; its proposed ‘pod’ vehicles were not going to have a steering wheel or pedals and were going to have space for just two passengers. Having recently entered into partnership with Fiat Chrysler, <a href="http://www.wired.com/2016/12/googles-latest-self-driving-car-minivan/">Google is now putting its faith into a minivan</a> &#8211; equipped with both pedals and steering wheels.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>This may also have been, at least in part, a response to new laws on the use of driverless cars. The <a href="http://fortune.com/2016/12/09/michigan-self-driving-cars/">state of California – where Google is based &#8211; has stipulated that self-driving cars must have steering wheels and brake pedals.</a> In Michigan, regulators are working on new laws which would legalize the testing of vehicles without steering wheels and pedals – allowing for no human intervention. It is thought that Michigan wants to gain an advantage on California, which has so far been at the forefront of driverless car development.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>The driverless future is within our reach. What’s not clear is to what extent autonomous vehicles will replace traditional ones. Will individuals still own cars – and hence need parking spaces in their neighborhoods and near local amenities? Or will you be able to simply hail or get on a driverless vehicle as you would do with a taxi or bus right now. The latter scenario would make a major difference to cities’ traffic management and town planning. Gauging these developments will be important not only for the companies involved in building the vehicles but also for road authorities and city planners.</p>
</div>
</div>


Self-driving cars may be coming right around the corner. Soon we will be able to sit back and relax during travel while super-computers get us around.

Experts Predict the Timeline for Self-Driving Cars

Get ready. The driverless future is just on the horizon.

<p>Artificial intelligence already plays a major role in human economies and societies, and it will play an even bigger role in the coming years. To ponder the future of AI is thus to acknowledge that the future <i>is</i> AI.</p>
<p>This will be partly owing to advances in “deep learning,” which uses multi layer neural networks that were first theorized in the 1980s. With today’s greater computing power and storage, deep learning is now a practical possibility, and a deep-learning application gained worldwide attention in 2016 by beating the world champion in Go. Commercial enterprises and governments alike hope to adapt the technology to find useful patterns in “Big Data” of all kinds.</p>
<p>In 2011, IBM’s Watson marked another AI watershed, by beating two previous champions in <i>Jeopardy!,</i> a game that combines general knowledge with lateral thinking. And yet another significant development is the emerging “Internet of Things,” which will continue to grow as more gadgets, home appliances, wearable devices, and publicly-sited sensors become connected and begin to broadcast messages around the clock. Big Brother won’t be watching you; but a trillion little brothers might be.</p>
<figure class="st__content-block st__content-block--image">
<figure style="width: 903px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img src="https://assets.weforum.org/editor/QIX4W2fYjVvj9Y8oVu0XE4VOp7_gWhyiwEgF3-oL76Q.png" alt=" Image 1" width="903" height="656" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Image: CB Insights</figcaption></figure>
</figure>
<p>Beyond these innovations, we can expect to see countless more examples of what were once called “expert systems”: AI applications that aid, or even <a href="https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/human-implications-of-artificial-intelligence-by-luciano-floridi-2017-01">replace</a>, human professionals in various specialties. Similarly, robots will be able to perform tasks that could not be automated before. Already, robots can carry out virtually every role that humans once filled on a warehouse floor.</p>
<p>Given this trend, it is not surprising that some people foresee a point known as the “Singularity,” when AI systems will exceed human intelligence, by intelligently improving themselves. At that point, whether it is in 2030 or at the end of this century, the robots will truly have taken over, and AI will consign war, poverty, disease, and even death to the past.</p>
<p>To all of this, I say: Dream on. Artificial <i>general </i>intelligence (AGI) is still a pipe dream. It’s simply too difficult to master. And while it may be achieved one of these days, it is certainly not in our foreseeable future.</p>
<p>But there are still major developments on the horizon, many of which will give us hope for the future. For example, AI can make reliable legal advice available to more people, and at a very low cost. And it can help us tackle currently incurable diseases and <a href="https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/artifical-intelligence-disrupting-health-care-by-spencer-nam-2017-01">expand access to credible medical advice</a>, without requiring additional medical specialists.</p>
<p>In other areas, we should be prudently pessimistic – not to say dystopian – about the future. AI has worrying implications for the military, individual privacy, and employment. Automated weapons already exist, and they could eventually be capable of autonomous target selection. As Big Data becomes more accessible to governments and multinational corporations, our personal information is being increasingly compromised. And as AI takes over more routine activities, many professionals will be deskilled and displaced. The nature of work itself will change, and we may need to consider providing a “universal income,” assuming there is still a sufficient tax base through which to fund it.</p>
<p>A different but equally troubling implication of AI is that it could become a substitute for one-on-one human contact. To take a trivial example, think about the annoyance of trying to reach a real person on the phone, only to be passed along from one automated menu to another. Sometimes, this is vexing simply because you cannot get the answer you need without the intervention of human intelligence. Or, it may be emotionally frustrating, because you are barred from expressing your feelings to a fellow human being, who would understand, and might even share your sentiments.</p>
<p>Other examples are less trivial, and I am particularly worried about computers being used as “carers” or “companions” for elderly people. To be sure, AI systems that are linked to the Internet and furnished with personalized apps could inform and entertain a lonely person, as well as monitor their vital signs and alert physicians or family members when necessary. Domestic robots could prove to be very useful for fetching food from the fridge and completing other household tasks. But whether an AI system can provide genuine <i>care</i> or <i>companionship</i> is another matter altogether.</p>
<p>Those who believe that this is possible assume that natural-language processing will be up to the task. But “the task” would include having emotionally-laden conversations about people’s personal memories. While an AI system might be able to recognize a limited range of emotions in someone’s vocabulary, intonation, pauses, or facial expressions, it will never be able to match an appropriate human response. It might say, “I’m sorry you’re sad about that,” or, “What a lovely thing to have happened!” But either phrase would be literally meaningless. A demented person could be “comforted” by such words, but at what cost to their human dignity?</p>
<p>The alternative, of course, is to keep humans in these roles. Rather than replacing humans, robots can be human aids. Today, many human-to-human jobs that involve physical and emotional caretaking are undervalued. Ideally, these jobs will gain more respect and remuneration in the future.</p>
<p>But perhaps that is wishful thinking. Ultimately, the future of AI – our AI future – is bright. But the brighter it becomes, the more shadows it will cast.</p>


Artificial Intelligence

Should we be optimistic or pessimistic about the future of artificial intelligence?

What Will a World Governed by AI Look Like?

Synthetic Intelligence is coming. Here's what to expect.

<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p><i>Imagine a future where self-driving cars, trains and buses are all seamlessly connected through an app, where traffic jams are a thing of the past and redundant car parks have been turned into green spaces. This could be the world we live in by 2030, says Cathis Elmsäter-Svärd, Chairwoman of Drive Sweden and a member of the Global Future Council on Mobility, in this interview.</i></p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<h2>Why Should We Be Thinking About the Future of Mobility?</h2>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>All over the world, cities are growing. Urban dwellers typically live, produce, consume and socialize in different neighborhoods. One of the biggest factors in determining whether we actively enjoy everyday life in a city, or merely have to live there because that’s where the work is, is how much time we spend in traffic jams or standing at bus stops.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>The quality of urban mobility is also integral to many other issues we care about: health, because of emissions and accidents; economic growth, through minimizing the time lost in getting workers and products to where they need to be; and inequality – does everyone have the opportunity to move around, or only those who can drive themselves?</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<h2>How Different Might Urban Mobility Look by 2030?</h2>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>By then, instead of owning and driving our own cars, we may routinely be calling up self-driving cars via a sharing-economy platform whenever we need one. They’ll pick us up, drop us at our destination, and pick up someone else, controlled by a smart traffic management system. It’s the concept of “mobility as a service” – a function of automation, digitalization and the shared economy.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>But that should be only one part of how mobility has changed by 2030. I envisage that we will have fully automated transport systems where various forms of transport – self-driving cars, trains and buses, cycling, walking – are seamlessly integrated by technology.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>We’ll move goods differently, as well as people – perhaps we’ll have small robots making last-mile deliveries, or sophisticated networks of parcel drop-off points, for people to have their shopping delivered to a convenient location where they can collect at their leisure.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>All of this should make urban transport work more efficiently, giving us fewer vehicles on the roads, cleaner air and less noise pollution. We’ll need fewer car parks, and they could become green areas or other facilities, making cities even more liveable and likeable.</p>
</div>
<figure class="st__content-block st__content-block--image">
<figure style="width: 1200px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img src="https://assets.weforum.org/editor/qhE6OLJ4_6JviYHBrnxDV5Vv39kPn2-XobAsdDA_vFk.png" alt=" " width="1200" height="658" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Image: Boston Consulting Group</figcaption></figure>
</figure>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<h2>What Would a Seamlessly Integrated, Automated Transport System Look Like?</h2>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Imagine an app that gives you, in real time, information about door-to-door options for your journey: say, walking time and directions to the nearest city bike; or where the nearest self-driving car is, and the anticipated journey time given current traffic conditions; when the next bus or train is due; or combinations of these options, sorted by price or time or environmental impact. And you can use the app to summon a car, unlock the bike, or buy your train ticket.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<h2>What Are the Potential Roadblocks in Realizing This Vision?</h2>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>People will naturally have fears related to the technology. Some will have privacy concerns about an online system always knowing where you are, where you’re going and where you’ve been. Others will worry about cybersecurity – will automated vehicles be secure against hacking?</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Political leaders will also need to raise their hands and be willing to be at the forefront of developing these new solutions to mobility. Much of this future vision remains theoretical, and people are often afraid to be the first movers – they want to learn from the mistakes of others.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<h2>What Should Governments Be Doing?</h2>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>We need to speed up progress on regulations – technology in autonomous vehicles is progressing more quickly than debates on how insurance should work, and who should bear responsibility for accidents. City governments also tend to budget year-by-year, so they need to find more creative ways of unlocking the necessary investment in new infrastructure.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Each city also faces local challenges depending on their circumstances. The easiest situation is when you’re building a new area in a city, or a whole new city, as you can think about mobility solutions at the same time as you plan new housing. But most cities have to work out how to adapt their existing mass transport systems, or urban environments that evolved to be about cars rather than walking.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<h2>Are There Examples Today of Cities Leading the Way?</h2>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Lots are trying, but transport is a very conservative area. What you tend to see now are cities focusing on progress in one particular area – for example, Copenhagen has cycling high on the agenda, while Oslo is putting more attention into electric cars, and so on.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>The organization I chair, Drive Sweden, is bringing together stakeholders from all sectors in the country – government, industry, academia – to address the challenges in moving towards seamlessly automated transport systems for the country’s cities. We will next year designate areas in Stockholm and Gothenburg to have tests in real environments with all kinds of solutions based on digitalization and automation, creating a policy lab which we hope will be of international interest.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>We need to recognize that this is much more than a transport issue. We should identify the implications for every sector – environment, trade, health – and look for the win-wins.</p>
</div>


Catharina Elmsäter-Svärd, the chairwoman of Drive Sweden envisions a 2030 where car ownership and traffic jams are a thing of the past.

Expert: Self-Driving Cars Will Eliminate Traffic Jams by 2030

All of your transportation needs will be met by an app.

<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Cutting global emissions by half by 2050 calls on the full deployment of existing energy efficient potential. Despite energy efficient technologies’ proven track record as a cost-effective mean to reduce energy consumption and related emissions, its full potential is yet to be tapped. The investment gap is a key element in explaining the remaining potential.</p>
<figure id="attachment_73482" style="width: 360px" class="wp-caption alignright"><a href="https://futurism.com/images/technological-fixes-for-climate-change/"><img class="" src="https://wp-assets.futurism.com/2017/03/Technological-Fixes-for-Climate-Change_home_v1.jpg" alt="" width="360" height="240" /></a><figcaption class="wp-caption-text"><a href="https://futurism.com/images/technological-fixes-for-climate-change/">CLICK FOR FULL INFOGRAPHIC</a></figcaption></figure>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Public money is increasing &#8211; but more is still needed from the private sector. Today, an average of around $130 billion has been invested in energy efficiency improvement yearly, equivalent to 15% of fossil fuel investment, or one fifth of power sector investment. The International Energy Agency (IEA) estimates that to achieve the below 2-degree scenario, energy efficiency (EE) investments need to reach <a href="http://www.se4all.org/sites/default/files/SE4All-Advisory-Board-Finance-Committee-Report.pdf">$560 billion/year over the next 15 years</a>, an increase of over four times the current level.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Higher private investments are needed to bridge the gap. The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) shows that 86% of those investments need to be private.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>In 2016, low-interest rates prevailed in mature economies, at <a href="http://www.centralbanknews.info/p/interest-rates.html">close to zero</a>. Money is available and cheap, with Bain &amp; Company projecting that the volume of total financial assets will be 10 times larger than the value of global GDP growth to 2020. Concurrently, an increasing number of private financial players are willing and stringently committing to greening their finance. Yet, the EE gap is still unfilled. Why?</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Private investments are still hindered by the enduring (if unfounded) risk perception of energy efficiency projects. Contrary to traditional investments, EE gains are intangible in nature (they don’t come with incremental physical production) and difficult to measure. The uncertainties surrounding EE savings, reinforced by the absence of an internationally recognized monitoring protocol, result in a perception that EE operational risks are high. Energy efficient technologies are often assumed to be unreliable; with a concomitant risk of not transforming into adequate return cash flows. This results in much higher transaction costs.</p>
</div>
<h2 class="st__content-block st__content-block--heading">Making the Transition to a Low-Carbon World</h2>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>In the coming 15 years, 3 billion additional people will join the middle class. Today, around 2 billion people still lack access to reliable electricity. Our challenge in the next 40 years is to provide energy services for close to 5 billion additional people, building a system that delivers <a href="http://www.energy-transitions.org/sites/default/files/20160426%20ETC%20Position%20Paper%20vF.pdf">100GJ per capita to more than 9 billion people</a>, while cutting our emissions by half. This entails a sharp decrease in our carbon intensity and an efficiency improvement by a factor of three.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>It&#8217;s time for action. Projects are not happening at the necessary scale or pace. Cities, for instance, soon host to more than 70% of the world population, have a significant potential for increased savings. While smart city projects are on the rise worldwide, their development remains at the planning phase and viable business models for easy scaling up are still to be found. Execution challenges pile up and have led for instance to the push back of Masdar City completion from 2016 to 2030. <a href="http://www.tribuneindia.com/mobi/news/comment/smart-cities-for-smart-people/99712.html">Similar hurdles</a> also plague China’s ambition to build 154 smart cities, where several newly created eco-cities are abandoned by developers before completion.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Buildings, <a href="https://www.iea.org/publications/freepublications/publication/Building2013_free.pdf">where half of world’s electricity is consumed</a>, are among the most inefficient infrastructures, with 80% untapped EE potential. The IEA estimates that buildings energy performance per square meter needs to improve from a rate of 1.5% per year in the past decade to at least 2.5% per year over the next decade to 2025. Solutions exist to get us there. Building control systems can deliver 30% energy savings by combining comprehensive automation, control, and monitoring of energy use, with a payback of less than 3 years. Similarly, in other sectors, deploying available technologies by bridging market barriers, could unlock the 79% unrealized efficiency potential in infrastructure, and the 58% potential of Industries.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>The digitization of the economy and the advancement of smart grid technologies, such as intelligent metering, automated analytics, demand response, enable customers to produce, consume, store and sell within a dynamic electricity system.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Customers are at the center of the New Energy World transformation. Yet in our current energy system, less than one third of total generation reaches end-users. The rest is scattered along the energy value chain in production and T&amp;D losses. Lagging behind in this transition will be detrimental to individuals and the planet, by giving citizens less choice on how, what, and when they consume energy.</p>
</div>
<h2 class="st__content-block st__content-block--heading">What Can be Done?</h2>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p><b>Scaling up of risk-sharing instruments.</b> Previous experiences with risk mitigation instruments have been very successful. The case of the International Finance Corporation (IFC)’s risk-sharing facility and programs come to mind with Commercializing Energy Efficiency Finance (CEEF): a program that provides guarantees to EE investments in Eastern Europe. IFC guarantees up to 50% of the loss from loan defaults, a risk-sharing arrangement that encourages commercial banks to lend. Local banks select projects and design their credit facilities. The IFC has also been active in China under a similar mechanism. From 2006 to 2009, the China Utility Based Energy Efficiency Finance Program (CHUEE) provided USD 512 billion in loans to 78 companies without a default loss.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>The European Union should be commended for building on such success and launching the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI), jointly with the European Investment Bank (EIB) and the EU Commission. Such initiative provides a EUR 16bn guarantee from the EU budget and EUR 5 billion of EIB’s own capital, and encourages higher risk projects in Europe. This scheme has recently loaned EUR 100 million to Energies POSIT’IF, a public-private company that aims to make condominium <a href="http://www.eib.org/attachments/thematic/investment_plan_for_europe_en.pdf">buildings in Paris region more energy efficient</a>. The loan and risk guarantee enables the provision of financing to owners and resulted in the tripling of apartments expected to undergo renovation in the coming year.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p><b>Additional work is still needed to analyze the best combination of financial and other instruments</b> (such as training, education, capacity building or awareness building) for reducing high levels of perceived risk. The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is working closely with local financial institutions and technical partners to transfer international best practice skills, supporting the origination of technically feasible investment opportunities.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p><b>To unlock private investments, policy-makers need to rise up and provide adequate policy signals.</b> Risk-sharing instruments should be scaled up and deployed. Subsidies and other market failures insulating customers from the true price of energy should be corrected; including the internalization of climate change externalities. The establishment of a platform for continuous public-private dialogue would facilitate alignment of stakeholders involved in enabling and accelerating this transition: financiers; industries; policy makers; citizens. Leveraging existing institutions and initiatives that facilitate international public-private exchanges, data and resource sharing on these issues, is urgently needed.</p>
</div>
<figure class="st__content-block st__content-block--image"><img src="https://assets.weforum.org/editor/u4SWZ456ibZaAVwkdFMr2ngPeGCDvPGlZN12IPUdiaE.JPG" alt=" " /></figure>


Earth & Energy

Great strides are being made with public money being allocated to green initiatives but the private sector can do much more to speed along the process.

Humans Are the Reason Why a Necessary Energy Revolution Has yet to Happen

Today, around 2 billion people still lack access to reliable electricity.

<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>China may be the <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-solar-idUSKBN15J0G7?utm_campaign=trueAnthem:+Trending+Content&amp;utm_content=589663fb04d301059ff13d69&amp;utm_medium=trueAnthem&amp;utm_source=twitter">largest producer of solar energy in the world</a>, but neighboring India is no less ambitious when it comes to renewable energy. Expected to become the <a href="http://www.bridgetoindia.com/indian-solar-capacity-crosses-10-gw-milestone/">world’s third-biggest solar market </a>after China and the USA, it is putting its money where its mouth is. A case in point: the country has just put the world’s largest solar power plant into service.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>This is good news not just for India’s future energy security but also for its people’s short-term energy needs.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<h2>Beating Records</h2>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p><a href="http://www.adanipower.com/media/media-release/media-details?title=AdaniunveilstheworldslargestsolarpowerplantinTamilNaduanddedicatesittothenation">The Adani Group’s new site in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu</a> covers an area of 10 square kilometers and has a capacity of 648 megawatts (MW). This is nearly 100 MW more than<a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/11/india-unveils-world-largest-solar-power-plant-161129101022044.html"> the previous record-holder</a>, the Topaz Solar Farm in California.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>The plant was built in only eight months, comprises 2.5 million individual solar modules and cost $679m to build. It is estimated that it will produce enough electricity to power about 150,000 homes at full capacity.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p><a href="http://www.abb.com/cawp/seitp202/5c93aa475c87e687c1257fcd003a9096.aspx">Made up of five plants in a single location</a>, the solar photovoltaic project has helped push India&#8217;s total installed solar capacity<a href="http://www.bridgetoindia.com/indian-solar-capacity-crosses-10-gw-milestone/"> across the 10 gigawatt mark</a>, which <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/11/india-unveils-world-largest-solar-power-plant-161129101022044.html">only a handful of countries </a>can claim.</p>
</div>
<figure class="st__content-block st__content-block--image">
<figure style="width: 816px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img src="https://assets.weforum.org/editor/-VxC2rdYrTQlCTy0IKrJGHX4B2Jsm6Q_yQ6gO1rUmBQ.PNG" alt=" Installed solar capacity and cost in India " width="816" height="673" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Installed solar capacity and cost in India. Image: Bridge to India</figcaption></figure>
<div class="image__caption"></div>
</figure>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<h2>Leading the World in Renewables</h2>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>A signatory of the Paris Agreement, India is forecast to meet its renewable energy commitments three years early and exceed them by nearly half. The country is aiming to generate <a href="http://uk.reuters.com/article/india-renewables-solar-idUKL5N1F74JN">nearly 60% of its electricity</a> from non-fossil sources by 2027.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Solar is a particular focus: it makes up only 16% of renewable energy capacity now but is set to contribute over half of the renewables target by 2022: <a href="http://uk.reuters.com/article/india-renewables-solar-idUKL5N1F74JN">100 gigawatts of 175 GW</a>. Large installations will be key to achieving this, and the government is planning 33 solar parks in 21 states, with a capacity of at least 500 megawatts each.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<h2>Plugging a Gap</h2>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Prioritizing solar is not just an investment in the future, though. India is one of the world’s fastest growing economies, and its energy use has doubled since 2000, according to the <a href="https://www.iea.org/media/news/2015/press/FactsheetIndia.pdf">International Energy Agency</a>.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Last year, the country declared that it had a power surplus for the first time ever, though <a href="http://www.thehindu.com/data/Many-don%E2%80%99t-have-power-in-%E2%80%98power-surplus-India%E2%80%99/article14488504.ece">The Hindu</a> reported that 300 million people still don’t have access to electricity and power cuts continue to be ‘rampant.’ The issue, it appears, is that capacity remains unused in the grid because some state power companies simply cannot afford to buy sufficient electricity.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>The Indian government has recently launched an energy ‘blueprint’, and raised its investment target for solar energy <a href="http://uk.reuters.com/article/india-renewables-solar-idUKL5N1F74JN">to $100 billion</a> in an attempt to address both these near-term issues as well as securing its energy supply far into the future.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>This will be important <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/jan/19/china-builds-worlds-biggest-solar-farm-in-journey-to-become-green-superpower">even if China is about to overtake India with an even larger solar power plant </a>which is capable of producing 850 MW of power, enough to supply up to 200,000 households.</p>
</div>


India is now home to a 10 square kilometer (over 6 square miles), 648 MW solar farm, the largest in the entire world.
The country has one of the fastest growing economies and is getting increasing amounts of energy from renewable sources.

India Just Broke a World Record With Its New Solar Farm

The country is thinking big when it comes to clean energy.

<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p><i>Artificial intelligence and robotics are coming into our lives more than ever before and have the potential to transform healthcare, transport, manufacturing, even our domestic chores. Mary “Missy” Cummings, Director of the Humans and Autonomy Lab (HAL) at Duke University, </i><i>and co-chair of the Global Future Council on Artificial Intelligence and Robotics, says the technology will work best in collaboration with humans. While cab drivers may fear for their jobs, she envisages a worldwide shortage of roboticists in 2030.</i></p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p><b>First of all, why should the world care about AI and robotics?</b></p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Artificial intelligence and robotics are showing up in every part of life, anywhere from driving, to the cellphones we use, how our data is managed in the world, how our homes are going to be built in the future. So given its ubiquity, it really is important to start addressing the strengths and limitations of artificial intelligence.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p><b>Tell me about the technological breakthroughs we have already seen, and what you expect to see in the coming years?</b></p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>We’ve seen a lot of breakthroughs in data analytics. The example of Watson – which is an IBM set of algorithms – has been very impressive in terms of managing large amounts of data, and how to structure the data so that you can see patterns that may have not emerged otherwise. That has been an important leap. But oftentimes people confuse that leap with machine intelligence and the way that we think about intelligence for humans and it’s simply not true. So the big leaps that we have had recently in data analytics are important but also leave a lot of room for humans to assist these systems. I think the wave of the future is the collaboration of humans and these artificial intelligence technologies.</p>
</div>
<figure class="st__content-block st__content-block--image"><img src="https://wp-assets.futurism.com/2016/11/Bg3MoZzHUuWrxfxfIjn7rV2mTRTrMSXNUdcqZXclm-0.png" alt=" " /></p>
<div class="image__credit">Image: CB Insights</div>
</figure>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p><b>How is the world of AI and robotics changing society, and changing us?</b></p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>In a way it is making us smarter because we are able to leverage computers to search these databases in ways that we couldn’t before. It will change, for example, healthcare because we’re going to see these machine learning techniques try to get a better understanding of what symptoms might lead to certain diseases.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>Right now, artificial intelligence is not nearly as smart as people would like it to be. We’re nowhere near a car that can drive itself under all conditions at all times, but we will see cars that can drive themselves very reliably under slow conditions and in environments that are relatively structured, on freeways, for example, with additional sensors that we can put in the roads.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p><b>What do you see as the ethical implications of AI and robotics?</b></p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>We need to be sure that the decision logic that we programme into systems is what we perceive to be ethical and then, of course, that the sensors can actually detect the world as it is. So we’re nowhere near letting robots release weapons because their ability to detect a target with a high degree of certainty is not good.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>There is a lot of argument right now concerning driverless cars, about how Google has programmed an algorithm to hit a building before it hits a person. It is interesting to think about this idea of utilitarianism; should we go for the greater good, or should we work from the respect for persons approach? Why is it that a pedestrian gets a higher priority than me having to be slammed into a building? I think humans actually can live with the fact that we can be killed by another human driving a car, but we cross some imaginary boundary when we think that it’s a computer that decides to take our life over another life.</p>
</div>
<figure class="st__content-block st__content-block--image"><img src="https://wp-assets.futurism.com/2016/11/KqxdoPuUKYvep27LUdnKSMNPPZ7wRy9znESaetP5UYI.png" alt=" " /></figure>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p><b>To what extent are regulations and governance keeping pace with new technologies? What more needs to be done?</b></p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>In the United States, the regulatory agencies have, in general, not kept pace with the technology. It’s becoming even more of a problem now because the government can’t hire people who understand how these systems operate under the hood because the systems are largely software-driven.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>The regulatory environment is going to become more and more contentious. For physics-based systems, like a new physical bomb, we can test that; we understand what the mechanisms are, we can have inspection teams go in. But with software, it is actually very difficult to understand whether or not code is safe and how it works. These artificially intelligent systems never perform the same way twice, even under the exact same conditions, so how do we test that? How do we know there are any guarantees of safety? This is going to become a thornier issue as we go forward. <b></b></p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--searchable-list list-group">
<h3 class="list-group__header"><span class="list-group__title">Have you read?</span></h3>
<ul class="list-group__items">
<li class="list-group__item"><a href="https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/11/would-you-let-an-algorithm-choose-the-next-us-president">Would you let an algorithm choose the next US president?</a></li>
<li class="list-group__item"><a href="https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/09/can-we-create-robots-with-human-emotions">Should we build robots that feel human emotions?</a></li>
<li class="list-group__item"><a href="https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/10/top-10-ethical-issues-in-artificial-intelligence">Top 9 ethical issues in artificial intelligence</a></li>
</ul>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p><b>Where will we be in 2030? How will robotics and AI have changed our lives?</b></p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>We’ll see more technology in terms of smart homes that understand your behaviour and change the heat and do various tasks around the home. You’ll see medicine improve. You will see limited driverless car markets that provide some local transportation options.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p>We will live in an improved world but we’re also going to have to start grappling with the issues of job displacement, if more and more taxi cab drivers lose their jobs, if more and more manufacturing technologies go over to 3D-printers and robotics. We’re going to see a global shift in low-wage, low-skilled jobs. So in 2030, we’re going to have a much bigger debate on what we do with people who need retraining. In concert with that, you’re going to see companies held hostage by the need to have hard-to-find roboticists and PhDs in artificial intelligence attend to, maintain, and fix these systems.</p>
</div>
<div class="st__content-block st__content-block--text">
<p><i><a href="https://www.weforum.org/events/annual-meeting-of-global-future-councils-2016">The Annual Meeting of the Global Future Councils</a> is taking place on 13-14 November in Dubai.</i></p>
</div>


A leading expert on the development of artificial intelligence spoke about where she thinks the future of AI is heading.
The shift toward more autonomy will have a major impact on the job market, low skilled jobs will be more scarce and demand for highly skilled roboticists will skyrocket.

/Author

World Economic Forum

Future Society

Welcome to 2030. I Own Nothing, Have No Privacy, and Life Has Never Been Better

Advanced Transport

India Will Sell Only Electric Cars Within the Next 13 Years

Off World

The Future May Owe Itself to Blockchain Technology. Here’s Why.

Sci-Fi Visions

Where Will Space Tech Take Us by 2030?

Advanced Transport

Experts Predict the Timeline for Self-Driving Cars

Artificial Intelligence

What Will a World Governed by AI Look Like?

Advanced Transport

Expert: Self-Driving Cars Will Eliminate Traffic Jams by 2030

Earth & Energy

Humans Are the Reason Why a Necessary Energy Revolution Has yet to Happen

Earth & Energy

India Just Broke a World Record With Its New Solar Farm

Artificial Intelligence

Here’s What Artificial Intelligence Will Look Like in 2030

Load More