Smarter Than the Storm: Championing the Ai-climate Nexus for a Truly Sustainable Future

Our planet stands at a defining juncture. Climate change is no longer a distant threat but a lived reality, multiplying risks across food, water, health, peace, technology and economic stability. At the same time, AI is advancing at unprecedented speed, offering powerful tools to cut through complexity and strengthen resilience. In Smarter Than the Storm, Amitabh Kant and Siddharth Sinha explore this interplay with compelling clarity. The book deep-dives into AI's promise, but, at the same time, also its dilemma. On the one hand, AI can accelerate climate action by advancing mitigation, adaptation and governance. On the other, it carries a growing environmental footprint. The book expounds how climate risks cascade across sectors, societies and economies, creating vicious cycles, and demonstrates, through global case studies, how AI can be deployed to tackle climate change. With an eye on the future, it also makes the case for climate- and community-positive data centres, open and sovereign AI models that democratize innovation, and digital public infrastructure that expands access to climate data, together forming a road map whose principles apply across sectors, geographies and challenges. Written in an accessible manner, and interspersed with characters reflecting lived realities, Smarter Than the Storm invites readers to think boldly about AI and climate solutions that are both effective and people-positive, transforming vicious cycles into virtuous ones and the climate crisis into a collective opportunity.