homesweethomeMrL

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/32465427

Datacentres consume just 1% of the world’s electricity but may soon demand much more. Their share of US electricity is projected to more than double to 8.6% by 2035, according to BloombergNEF, while the IEA projects datacentres will account for at least 20% of the rich world’s growth in electricity demand to the end of the decade.

“This idea that the lower cost of renewables alone will drive decarbonisation – it’s not enough,” said Daly. “Because if there’s a huge source of energy demand that wants to grow, it will land on these stranded fossil fuel assets.”

Tech companies have resisted pressure to provide detailed data on their AI energy footprints,

The IEA estimates that AI could boost technically recoverable oil and gas reserves by 5% and cut the cost of a deepwater offshore project by 10%. Big oil is even more bullish. “Artificial intelligence is, ultimately, within the industry, going to be the next fracking boom,” Mike Sommers, head of the American Petroleum Institute, told Axios.

At the same time, the oil and gas industry says AI can cut its carbon intensity, for instance by analysing satellite data to spot methane leaks. But even here, critics say there is a gap between digital insights and corporate actions.

The University of Rhode Island's AI lab estimates that GPT-5 averages just over 18 Wh per query, so putting all of ChatGPT's reported 2.5 billion requests a day through the model could see energy usage as high as 45 GWh.

A daily energy use of 45 GWh is enormous. A typical modern nuclear power plant produces between 1 and 1.6 GW of electricity per reactor per hour, so data centers running OpenAI's GPT-5 at 18 Wh per query could require the power equivalent of two to three nuclear power reactors, an amount that could be enough to power a small country.