As of 2025, nearly 1.1 billion people on the planet lack drinking water. Upwards of 2.4 billion people are without proper, clean drinking water, and are disposed to diseases like cholera. In a February 2025 study, authored by University of California Riverside and The University of Texas at Arlington, it was found tech conglomerates were utilizing 9 liters of water per kWh of energy used. In other words, a roughly 4-minute conversation with OpenAI’s Chat-GPT utilizes approximately 500ml-1 liter of freshwater. By 2027, it is predicted AI-usage will utilize 6.6 billion cubic liters of water.
Grosse Pointe South earth science teacher Shawn McNamara, asserts that the mass-consumption of freshwater is not the only sole concern when it comes to AI’s environmental consequences.
“When you’re cooling the power plants, you’re using lake water,” McNamara said. “The water going back into the lake has a much higher temperature, so you’re changing the biotic characteristics of the water, which is going to decrease biodiversity. In other words, you’re changing the conditions people live in.”
However, consequences of AI power-consumption are not just limited to water consumption. Using AI also means increased carbon-dioxide emissions into the Earth’s atmosphere.
“Carbon emissions are linked to climate change. It used to be a weak correlation, but now it’s a strong correlation — so much so, it’s almost a causation,” McNamara said. “The warming effect causes positive-feedback loops in other systems. A warmer atmosphere means melting more ice, which changes the albedo in the surface, changing how reflective the ice is.”
Some students like Ian Bowman ’25 find that the effects of increased carbon emissions aren’t just related to damages in the environment, and instead span into the quality of human being’s lives.
“In a lot of countries, there is such pollution in the air it affects people’s lifespans and health,” Bowman said. “Carbon emissions are one of the most serious environmental problems that we’re dealing with today. It has an effect on climate change, welfare, [and] public health.
Grosse Pointe South students like Luahati Verzosa ’26 find the use of AI especially harmful, as it is just so easy to use.
“The danger is disproportionate to the ease of access,” Verzosa said. “It’s not like a car where there’s an entry cost or manufacturing [cost]. Though completely still an issue, it’s so inaccessible that it’s not as widespread.”
Bowman tends to agree with Verzosa’s claim, contending that students specifically don’t know or care about the consequences to an easy way out.
“[Environmental concerns] are one of the last things people think about,” Bowman said. “They just think of it as something on the other side of the screen that just explains things to them.”
Bowman also admitted a lack of knowledge in regards to the negative impacts of AI on the planet, claiming many students like himself might just be completely unaware.
“Just publicize it,” Bowman said. “Spreading information and warnings to make the connection in people’s minds.”
Verzosa finds that AI usage is especially harmful, as it serves to become nearly a substitute for original, creative thought, creating a cycle of dependency, in which students use it more and more, to greater and greater environmental detriment.
“Using AI kind of necessitates that you have a lack of creativity,” Verzosa said. “Especially in an educational context of writing something that’s supposed to be your own, and then walking into plagiarism stuff, it’s very definitively a perversion of everything than an intellectual space is supposed to be.”
Interim assistant principal, Katherine Parent finds it widely unsurprising that AI usage — and consequently other environmental concerns — are on a significant upswing.
“It’s human nature to only think about your immediate vicinity,” Parent said. “A lot of people — not just students — don’t even consider the larger repercussions of their actions, beyond their immediate sphere.”
Parent finds that as a teacher this year, unprompted AI usage among students has been on a serious up-tick.
“From one week to the next, I would say [AI usage] was more and more common,” Parent said. “Last year you would catch it like once per assignment, maybe even less than that.”
This summer, Grosse Pointe Public schools is set to run an AI summer workshop program through the company InsipiritAI. InspiritAI specializes in forms of AI like generative AI image creation, which is responsible for some of the most negative environmental concerns.
Tower contacted project sponsor and technology superintendent, Dr. Chris Stanley for comment regarding the program, the school district’s AI policy, and potential environmental issues.
“GPPSS does not have a formal policy currently on AI usage in the classroom. We did begin drafting one, but paused since it continues to rapidly change,” Stanley said. Since we do have a draft policy, we are still waiting for the right time to adopt it. We want to make sure that it’s as thoughtful and responsive to both the benefits and the concerns connect to AI in education. In the meantime, we continue to encourage responsible use of AI.”
When asked about concerns related environmentally to AI usage in the classroom, Stanley asserted that the district has yet to address planetary concerns with AI.
“Our draft did not address sustainability,” Stanley said. “However, we do acknowledge that it’s a piece of the larger conversation.
Stanley claims the program is specifically related to the inner-workings of artificial intellegence, teaching potential participants about the way in which AI is made.
“We’re excited to partner with InspiritAI, and host their summer program because we want students to be creators, not just consumers of technology,” Stanley said. “The goal here is to learn how AI works, and how one might be able to apply it to a real world issue.”
Despite the negative connotations to Artificial Intelligence, teachers like McNamara find that there are potentially positive ways in which AI can be used, specifically in the classroom.
“As an educator I am more comfortable with it than I used to be,” McNamara said. “When it’s used in the right way, it can be used to speed up research, or to help students or researchers gather up facts quicker, and I’m all for it. I’m not for it when it becomes a substitute for original thought.”
Verzosa agrees that there are benefits to some AI usage, but not in the traditional sense, especially in respect to the way in which AI is typically used.
“There are certain places where [AI] serves useful,” Verzosa said. “Medical applications like MRI imaging can detect certain cancers. Data-analysis can help people in a few cases a day, but beyond the perspective of regular capability, I [disagree with] AI.”
When it comes to research, McNamara says AI is now used unintentionally, and is nearly unavoidable today when using the internet.
“When I do a Google search that I am not intending to be AI, it is automatically AI-driven.” McNamara said. “But, that’s using tremendous amounts of energy.”
Recently, Google announced the production of a new nuclear power plant to fuel their AI, as every internet search powered by Google now utilizes generative AI. Today, artificial intelligence can be seen by many as simply unavoidable in day-to-day life.
However, McNamara believes that while significant environmental consequences exist, human beings will still maintain, and will learn to re-configure among poor conditions.
“Just like us living in warmer conditions, we’ll have to adapt, and other organisms will have to adapt too.” McNamara said.
Verzosa further emphasized the consequences of generative-AI, especially in light of its ease-of-use, highlighting that people should be both more conscious and wary of Artificial Intelligence as a tool .
“It’s a lot more dangerous and significant because it is such a regular thing that a regular person can do,” Verzosa said. “You can go ahead and, with the type of question, use gallons and gallons of water, and output tons of CO2. The danger is disproportionate to the ease of action.”
