Meeting surging demand for AI memory chips has a climate cost

Higher manufacturing volumes, efforts to deliver more complex and resource-intensive products, and additional production in nations with fossil fuel-reliant power grids will combine to increase the industry’s pollution profile, according to Ottawa-based research firm TechInsights Inc. Semiconductor manufacturing emissions will climb by about a third to 247 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent by 2030, the researcher forecasts. That’s higher than annual emissions of scores of countries and rough ...