Cultural heritage sites will soon be armed with new artificial intelligence-powered tools to help protect them against natural disasters and the ravages of war.
Paris-based HeritageWatch.AI, an independent, non-commercial body formed of four organizations, was initiated at France’s culture ministry on February 10 during the Artificial Intelligence Action Summit in the French capital.
The four co-founders are 3D-modelling firm Iconem, satellite imagery provider Planet Labs PBC (founded by three Nasa scientists), intergovernmental cultural heritage group, the Aliph (International alliance for the protection of heritage) Foundation, and Microsoft.
The quartet’s mission is to provide real-time information for the heritage sector by collecting high-resolution satellite images taken by Planet Labs PBC’s fleet of 200 satellites in orbit. This imagery will then be used by Iconem to create 3D models of each heritage site. Microsoft’s AI for Good Lab – which uses AI and climate data to identify vulnerable communities at risk of extreme heat, flooding, and rising sea levels – will crunch the data.
Geneva-based Aliph will use the information to continue helping heritage bodies when disasters strike. It has already handed out $100 million in grants to more than 500 heritage projects around the world since it launched in 2017. Beirut’s Sursock Museum, for example, received $500,000 shortly after the devastating 2020 port explosion. The funds were used to protect the structural integrity of the museum.
Many museums, libraries, and heritage sites in Ukraine have also been bolstered by Aliph in the wake of Russia’s invasion in 2022.
In a statement, Aliph said “HeritageWatch.AI is designed to enable the cultural heritage sector to move toward a prediction-based approach, identifying areas prone to crises and implementing mitigation measures ahead of disasters.”
“For instance, it aims to observe the progressive impact of desertification on earthen architecture in the Sahel region, of rising sea levels of coastal heritage, or the consequences of a hurricane on age-old sites,” the heritage body said. “In turn, organizations such as ALIPH will have more robust tools with which they can support impacted communities before they are in crisis. With their partners on the ground, ALIPH and other organizations can develop plans to protect and secure cultural heritage and identify and accompany the most relevant rehabilitation projects.”
Microsoft has injected an initial pledge of $1 million into the project over four years, plus $750,000 of “in-kind services.” Aliph has provided $250,000.
In a video for HeritageWatch.AI, the director of World Heritage at Unesco, Lazare Eloundo Assomo, said, “Usually in the event of a disaster, we have difficulty to access data on time in the affected site.”
Bastien Varoutsikos, Aliph’s director of strategy, said in the video that HeritageWatch.AI will give “us access to real-time data and monitoring as well as forecasting capacity so that we can develop even more robust and rapid responses.”
