A report from Morgan Stanley suggests the datacenter industry is on track to emit 2.5 billion tons by 2030, which is three times higher than the predictions if generative AI had not come into play.
The extra demand from GenAI will reportedly lead to a rise in emissions from 200 million tons this year to 600 million tons by 2030, thanks largely to the construction of more data centers to keep up with the demand for cloud services.
When I think “AI will end humanity” I was thinking a sort of Skynet type deal, not… this. Sigh.
I mean, global warming us slowly into extinction is a pretty AI way to go about it
God damnit not this swill again. It’s not even close to triple, it’s like 15%. Read. The. Reports.
For real. Why does this misinformation keep spreading? I have the actual real numbers right in front of me now.
And it’s the same as what MIT Technology Review reported and what Google reported publicly.
The EU’s CSRD requires most of these companies to disclose their carbon emissions. So just go look it up, ya taints.
I build the infrastructure that these data centers need to connect to the internet. Our projected power consumption is at least tripling from last year which was itself double the year before, and that’s only the power draw for the fiber optic infrastructure connecting these data centers together. They’re also building a ridiculous amount of computing power in those data centers which is another massive increase in power consumption.
There are some kind-of green efforts in progress to mitigate a bit of the environmental impacts of that increase in demand but most of what I have seen personally is just more draw from the local utility company. I have serious doubts about any data that indicates that tripling power consumption is not a major environmental problem.
If you’re the one working on this infrastructure, then why are the reports saying that it’s only 13%? Are you guys lying on the forms?
I have no idea where that data comes from and that’s exactly the point I’m making. It doesn’t match my personal experience at all.
You are not thinking cumulatively.
It’s not even close to triple, it’s like 15%.
1.15^7=2.66
From the article
“emit 2.5 billion tons by 2030, which is three times higher than the predictions if generative AI had not come into play.”
Something something AI BAD, didn’t read.
the most fucked up part about this is that it’s not like regular people account for more than a fraction of the AI usage, most of it is just other companies using it to replace workers or just… paying for AI usage instead of fucking paying a stock photo company instead…
i hate corporations i hate corporations i hate corporations
I actually got into a fight over suggesting someone to use stock photos instead of grungy-smeary AI generated images for their (sh)articles, so at least I won’t believe it was too AI generated. Then they insisted on it being their own creation, and how they became an artist through words.
Every negative article I read about AI is simply an attribution to capitalism. It’s incredibly funny.
Our planet is literally dying, and humankind is going to be decimated (at least) directly due to the actions of corporations.
Exactly! I was just saying the same thing in another post!
Few months ago it was bitcoin mining. They both need curtailment for other reasons as well.
Fuck this “AI” shit
I am curious who buys generative AI services? The consumers seem to be people making memes or questionable porn with free services. It can’t prepare food, unblock drains or tile a bathroom. You can’t use it for anything like medicine, law or engineering where you would be professionally liable if it fucks up. How is it sustainable?
Spammers
Consider this: climate change is being accelerated at a time when we are overdue to reduce it and what we are getting out of it is plagiarism and wrong answers.
Love to burn down an acre of rain forest to generate a picture of an ape.
you wouldn’t understand “progress”
Looks like AI will eliminate any gains we have in climate change. Too bad for us.
Gotta remember that AI is going to solve the climate crisis! \s
…and all so they can steal our collective content, creativity, and every piece of individual thought or content we’ve ever communicated online.
…with the aim of exploiting it to make billionaires richer.
This is only relevant to closed source AI. Not all AI is closed
Still, open source AI will still help the same companies getting richer because the needed computing power can be found in these data centers. The companies don’t even care if it’s AI, crypto or whatever the next thing is, as long as it needs lots of power and bandwidth.
I don’t care if our open source tools are used by rich people. That’s kinda the point. Everyone can use them.
I doubt the data centers are generating much of any co2. Fossil fuel power plants are.
then why are data centers using these fossil fuel power plants?
why are they getting lower rates to use them than an individual taxpayer?
What else would they use? Thats what’s available
Because they can build more capacity based on a long term contract with the utilities.
That’s just how things are… Fuck your peasants
Because the city built fossil fuel plants instead of renewable?
Cities don’t build power plants generally esp not large scale fossil fuel type
Neither do data centers
That’s right and that’s why they should be charged premium for their vanity exercises instead of being subsidized by the taxpayers
And then people were complaining about cryptocurrencies… Look at this AI joke… Come on…
ow nevermind, bitcoin mining alone is consuming 112.31 TWh annually (it’s a guess). While AI is using 29.2 TWh annually (also a guess).
Uhh, soo many datacenters run off wind. So this is pretty disingenuous
Tell me about it. In the Netherlands wind farms are built, and, on paper, these datacenter companies buy up all of the energy from them. Meanwhile, the reason why these wind farms were built is to burn less fossil fuels, but that won’t work now because of all the extra energy consumption.
You mean wind turbines.
This is a good thing. So wind turbine companies take that money and use it to build more wind turbines
What you call a good thing, I call green washing.
If everything is running on renewables, cool. Until then, there’s still the opportunity cost.
