In 1994, we got Earth 2, a TV show about a group of settlers trying to rebuild humanity on a new planet and now thirty years we’re getting Earth-2, a simulated copy of the Earth created by NVIDIA to better predict global weather.
Futurism explains:
”Chipmaker Nvidia has shown off a clone of our entire planet that could help meteorologists simulate and visualize global weather patterns at an “unprecedented scale,” according to a press release.
The ‘Earth climate digital twin,’ dubbed Earth-2, was designed to help recoup some of the economic losses caused by climate change-driven extreme weather.
Customers can access the digital twin through an API, allowing ‘virtually any user to create AI-powered emulations to speed delivery of interactive, high-resolution simulations ranging from the global atmosphere and local cloud cover to typhoons and turbulence.’
The company is hoping to help improve early warning systems for natural disasters and improve weather forecasts — and in a matter of seconds, not ‘minutes or hours in traditional CPU-driven modeling.’
Nvidia claims the new platform is both 1,000 faster at generating predictive images than current models and 3,000 times more energy efficient thanks to a — you guessed it — generative AI model called CorrDiff.
“Climate disasters are now normal — historic droughts, catastrophic hurricanes and generational floods appear in the news with alarming frequency,” said Nvidia founder and CEO Jensen Huang in a statement. “Earth-2 cloud APIs strive to help us better prepare for — and inspire us to act to moderate — extreme weather.”
Based on the extreme flooding that Dubai is currently experiencing with five inches of rain (a year and a half’s worth) falling in just one hour it’s clear that we do need something like an Earth-2 to help us simulate, model, and prepare for the new normal that is today’s weather.
Is Earth-2 the Greatest Idea Ever?
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