How Artificial Intelligence Could Help Fight Climate Change-Driven Wildfires and Save Lives

“Two years ago we started looking to artificial intelligence and machine learning because we believe those can be game changers.”In 2019, weather and climate events killed more than 4,000 people worldwide, and caused around $42 billion in insured losses, according to the insurer Munich Re. Compta’s goal is to limit losses with warnings that can help keep a small blaze from becoming a conflagration.The Compta system was first used in Brazil in a pilot program designed to test its effectiveness, but now is “available globally and operational,” Correia said by telephone.The company recently opened an office in California, which had its deadliest wildfire last year when a blaze blamed on PG&E Corp. “The fire seasons are two months longer than they were in the past decades, and wild fires today are burning six times the land area than they did before and lasting five times longer.’’Wildfires are just one of many threats as extreme weather costs keep rising.The trail of destruction through the first half of this year included flooded farm fields across the Midwest and carnage along the African coast from Cyclone Idai, which killed 1,013 people, according to Munich Re.One threat artificial intelligence could help humans prepare better for is hail, said David Gagne, a machine learning scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo. But these have been episodic and there aren’t machine learning tools on the back end to create a product rescue crews could use in all situations.“The whole game here is about putting the data to work for us,” Probert said.—What you need to know about 8chan, the controversial site tied to the El Paso shooting—Verizon’s unlimited plans are getting cheaper.