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Author	Dr Tania Sebastian
Organisation/Institution	School of Law, Vellore Institute of Law
Country	INDIA
Panel	Environmental Law
Title	Hidden Costs of Artificial Intelligence: Water Footprint and Environmental Inequities in the Global South
Abstract	Rapid proliferation of Artificial Intelligence (AI) has accelerated the global demand for computational infrastructure such as data centers, driving unprecedented growth in demand and consumption of energy and water. While the energy costs of AI are explored widely by scholars, the water footprint and the broader ecological burden of AI systems, borne disproportionately by the Global South, remain significantly understudied. This paper investigates how the scale of uptake and use of AI disproportionately affects the Global South - regions characterised by water scarcity, gaps in regulatory capacity and socio-economic inequity, among other vulnerabilities. By mapping patterns of water extraction and regulatory gaps, we demonstrate that the ecological impacts of AI are spatially unequal. Further, through a focused analysis of the environmental disclosure documents of leading AI service providers, we highlight inconsistencies in disclosure requirements, inadequacy in transparency and how this translates to ineffective monitoring of critical factors like groundwater over-extraction and pollution of water sources. Further, the paper also highlights gendered consequences of AI's water-footprint, including the increased burden on women in water-scarce regions. Building on evidence on electricity consumption, water consumption, thermal and chemical pollution of water sources by data-center operations, this paper situates AI's proliferation within a longer history of industrial revolution that has brought with it ecological damage, borne unequally by the Global South. The paper concludes with recommendations for legislative reforms that strengthen regulatory oversight through compulsory disclosures and data architecture that allow access to high-quality real-time reliable data for governance, monitoring and policy interventions.
Biography	Tania Sebastian is an Assistant Professor of Law at Vellore Institute of Technology, School of Law (VITSOL), Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India. Previously, she was Assistant Professor at Gujarat National Law University (GNLU) where she helped to establish the GUJCOST GNLU Centre of Excellence in Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs), a collaborative effect between the Government of Gujarat and GNLU. At VITSOL, she is a member of the Centre of IPR and was a University level member for Sustainability Initiatives. She also has litigation experience before the High Court of Delhi, and research experiences before the Judicial Academy and Indian Social Institute, both at New Delhi. She completed her LLM in IPRs and Cyber Laws from Indian Law Institute, New Delhi, and secured the first rank. Her doctoral work at NALSAR University, Hyderabad was in the area of trade secrets and its concerns of employee mobility before the Indian Courts. Her scholarship is a mix of policy issues concerning access to medicines and patents, and gender studies in the context of developing countries. Her current work earmarks the deficient working status of pharmaceutical patents in India. She has received numerous research grants, has published over 20 articles in law reviews and peer-reviews journals and book chapters. She has also served as a legal consultant for a report by the Law Commission of India on ‘Trade Secrets and Economic Espionage.’