In brief
- “What scares me is the energy consumption if you’re using ChatGPT,” Ceres Power CTO Caroline Hargrove said on a CNBC-moderated panel.
- An IEA report said that by 2026, the AI industry is expected to consume at least 10 times the electricity demand it had in 2023.
- Mary de Wysocki, chief sustainability officer at Cisco, said that it was important to be “responsible users of [AI] where we know where can add the benefit and not just use it because it’s potentially fun.”
On the negative side
Caroline Hargrove, the Chief Technology Officer of Ceres Power, has cautioned that the increasing use of artificial intelligence tools for efficiency could lead to a surge in energy consumption. Speaking at an “IOT: Powering the Digital Economy” panel, Hargrove expressed concern over the energy demands of AI technologies like ChatGPT, noting that even simple queries could significantly increase electricity usage.
An International Energy Agency report, published in January, highlighted that on average a typical Google search uses 0.3 watt-hours of electricity versus 2.9 watt-hours for a ChatGPT request.
The report suggested that when this technology is incorporated into 9 billion searches daily, it would require nearly 10 terawatt-hours of additional electricity a year.
More broadly, the IEA’s report said that by 2026, the “AI industry is expected to have grown exponentially to consume at least ten times its [electricity] demand in 2023.”
Hargrove said if this consumption was not managed properly “then the perverse effect could happen that we use so much more energy.”
Mary de Wysocki, chief sustainability officer at technology company Cisco, made a similar point in that it was important to be “responsible users of [AI] where we know where can add the benefit and not just use it because it’s potentially fun.”
On the positive side
Meanwhile, Bertrand Piccard, founder and chairman of the environmental non-profit organization Solar Impulse Foundation, said AI is a “fantastic way to reduce energy consumption” if it is well managed.
Piccard referred to the example of smart electricity grids using this technology that “will integrate intermittent renewable energy … with storage, with the distribution, with the consumption which means that almost no energy will be lost.”
“So [these are] the things that give me hope,” he said.
Transparency is needed
A report by the Climate Action Against Disinformation (CAAD) coalition, published in March, looked at the risks that AI could pose amid the climate crisis, including its growing energy demand.
Based on its findings, the coalition recommended that regulators ensure technology companies are transparent in reporting the energy used and emissions produced by their AI models.
CAAD also said governments should enforce these transparency rules with “clear, strong penalties” if companies fail to comply.
