Interview with Friederike Rohde: The environmental impact of AI as a public interest concern

This is an interview with Friederike Rohde, a sociologist of technology and researcher at the Institute for Ecological Economy Research, conducted in February 2024. In it a number of different topics at the intersection of the public interest (AI) and sustainability are discussed, including a commonality being the relation of both fields to distributional justice. Rohde cautions that the economic structure that AI is currently being developed within is unfortunately at odds with the public interest. At the same time, she also believes that intelligent algorithms and digitalisation can in essence contribute to environmental and climate protection in tangible ways.