AI Automation Index

Will AI Replace Sustainability Specialists?

Task-level automation exposure for Sustainability Specialists: 14 O*NET tasks scored against their work activities, plus the simulator.

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Developed & audited by Gini Loh

Automation Exposure

66% weighted task index

14 of 14 tasks scored

Median Salary

$83,050 / year

BLS OEWS, May 2025 — this exact occupation

Employment Level

Very High

1,087,090 people hold this job — size, not growth

Projected 2025–35

+3.9% employment change

98,700 openings a year · BLS line item

Pay by state

BLS OEWS publishes 54 state estimates for this occupation. Each is its own survey estimate, not the national median adjusted for local prices.

$46,700 – $108,160

Highest medians

District of Columbia $108,160

Maryland $101,500

Washington $100,360

Alabama $100,240

Delaware $95,040

Lowest medians

Puerto Rico $46,700

Arkansas $61,240

Louisiana $63,220

Virgin Islands $65,170

Nevada $67,330

State figures come from the 13-1199 row in the May 2025 state panel. States where the estimate was suppressed or too small to publish are absent.

What the score is made of

Each task is mapped to its work activities, scored for AI automation potential, and weighted by how important those activities are to the job. These are the components.

Automation potential 66%

Importance-weighted mean of the scored tasks. This is the headline index.

Physical work 0%

Share of weighted tasks in hands-on or machine-operating work activities.

Judgment & influence 45%

Share in analysis, decisions, teaching, directing, advising, or caring for others.

Routine administration 20%

Share in documenting, recording, and administrative activities.

Rewritten by O*NET 0%

Share of weighted tasks O*NET rewrote in a recent update. Reported, not folded into the score.

Consequence of error 0/100 Low

O*NET's own rating of how serious an uncorrectable mistake would be here — respondents, not us. Deliberately not in the index: the score measures what AI can do with the task content, and multiplying it by stakes would be our judgment dressed as data.

Constituent Task Mix

14 tasks for this occupation, weighted by work-activity importance. Shares below are of total task weight, not task count.

High exposure (≥ 60% of the task is automatable) 78%

11 tasks

Medium exposure (≥ 35%) 22%

3 tasks

Low exposure (below 35%) 0%

0 tasks

How would you survive?

Move your week away from the high-exposure tasks and toward the ones that need judgment. The simulator recalculates the index as you shift the mix.

Simulate Upskilling →

Emerging & rewritten tasks

Tasks O*NET added or rewrote for this occupation in its recent updates (05/2025 – 08/2026), with who proposed them. Additions are not in the scored task inventory — they are new work O*NET is still measuring, so they appear here and nowhere in the index. A Revision replaces a task that is scored, which is why only those move the "Rewritten by O*NET" share.

New 08/2020 · Occupational Expert

Deliver sustainability training to employees.

Constituent Tasks

#15981 · Core · 58% automatable

Develop sustainability project goals, objectives, initiatives, or strategies in collaboration with other sustainability professionals.

text generation — Business strategy needs stakeholder judgment and accountability

Develop sustainable business strategies or practices.

#15980 · Core · 72% automatable

Monitor or track sustainability indicators, such as energy usage, natural resource usage, waste generation, and recycling.

data analysis — Business indicator dashboards are AI-monitorable with human review

Monitor business indicators.

#15979 · Core · 67% automatable

Assess or propose sustainability initiatives, considering factors such as cost effectiveness, technical feasibility, and acceptance.

data analysis — Cost-effectiveness modeling from given data

Assess the cost effectiveness of products, projects, or services. Develop sustainable business strategies or practices.

#15973 · Core · 62% automatable

Provide technical or administrative support for sustainability programs or issues.

decision support — Drafts advice; accountability and context owned by human

Advise others on business or operational matters.

#15968 · Core · 55% automatable

Review and revise sustainability proposals or policies.

decision support — AI drafts guidelines; authority and context are human

Establish organizational guidelines or policies.

#15976 · Core · 80% automatable

Develop reports or presentations to communicate the effectiveness of sustainability initiatives.

text generation — Generate operational reports from structured data

Prepare operational reports.

#15975 · Core · 70% automatable

Create or maintain plans or other documents related to sustainability projects.

text generation — Standard financial documents drafted from data

Develop sustainable business strategies or practices. Prepare financial documents.

#15978 · Core · 65% automatable

Collect information about waste stream management or green building practices to inform decision makers.

information retrieval — Policy research synthesis, human validates sources

Research issues related to the environment or sustainable business practices.

#15969 · Core · 65% automatable

Research or review regulatory, technical, or market issues related to sustainability.

information retrieval — Policy research synthesis, human validates sources

Research issues related to the environment or sustainable business practices.

#15970 · Core · 55% automatable

Identify or investigate violations of natural resources, waste management, recycling, or other environmental policies.

information retrieval — Legal research strong, judgment and accountability human

Investigate legal issues.

#15971 · Core · 65% automatable

Identify or create new sustainability indicators.

information retrieval — Policy research synthesis, human validates sources

Research issues related to the environment or sustainable business practices.

#15977 · Core · 72% automatable

Create marketing or outreach media, such as brochures or Web sites, to communicate sustainability issues, procedures, or objectives.

text generation — Drafts copy and concepts; brand judgment and final polish human

Create marketing materials.

#15974 · Core · 66% automatable

Identify or procure needed resources to implement sustainability programs or projects.

information retrieval — Web research on goods/services, human verifies vendors

Obtain information about goods or services. Purchase products or services.

#15972 · Core · 68% automatable

Write grant applications, rebate applications, or project proposals to secure funding for sustainability projects.

text generation — Assemble proposal documents from provided content

Prepare proposal documents.

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Community Sentiment

Do you agree?

Do you agree with the AI automation risk score calculated for this occupation?

Method

How this was scored

1. Tasks. O*NET task statements for this occupation, from a release whose newest record is dated 08/2026.
2. Work activities. Each task maps to 1–5 Detailed Work Activities; each activity belongs to one of 41 Generalized Work Activities that O*NET rates for importance (1–5) in this occupation.
3. Automation potential. Every work activity carries one score for how far current AI can perform it end-to-end. Tasks inherit the mean of their activities.
4. Weighting. Task weight = 0.35 + 0.65 × (importance − 1)/4, scaled by how often the task is performed and by 0.7 for Supplemental tasks. Importance is the task's own O*NET rating where it exists (18,369 of 18,838 tasks); the rest inherit their work activities' importance. The index is the weighted mean.

Check: across the 910 occupations where O*NET also rates how far machine speed sets the pace, this index moves opposite to it (Spearman ρ = -0.49). The more a job is paced by equipment, the less of its task content AI can address — the relationship you would expect if the scoring is working.

Sources · O*NET 31.0 (task records to 08/2026) · BLS OEWS May 2025 · BLS projections 2025-2035 · rubric v2.1 · tasks for O*NET, not a forecast

See the full method →

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