Google’s emissions are up 48% in 5 years. Microsoft’s are up 30% since 2020. Those soaring figures are being driven by mass investments in data centers to power AI tools.
Generative AI is a climate disaster and data center expansion must be stopped.
@parismarx I’m not saying the mentioned energy statistics are wrong, but why is no one talking about the use of renewable energy that Google and other companies are investing in and using? Most people write about the overall amount of energy these companies consume and calculate the resulting emissions. However, I don’t see any information on how much of this energy comes from fossil fuels and how much comes from renewable sources.
@parismarx Not sure the problem is AI but it is the emissions. It could also be powered by renewables and the problem is that they use dirty energy. Not AI itself.
@parismarx How do they compare to mining and metal industries?
Don't get me wrong, all bad and stuff, but isn't that distracting from the main problem a bit? Maybe we should focus on getting rid of burning fossil fuels in order to produce energy and then fragment our efforts to whatever is getting on our nerves?
@parismarx This is why I hate environmentalists. What have environmentalists ever done for me other than make a manmade drought by refusing to allow any technologial solutions to increase the production of clean drinking water, make electricity more expensive by preventing the increase in electricity production, make the Internet slower by preventing the construction of new data centers and fiber optic lines, make transportation expensive by demanding unrealistic fuel economies and phasing out internal combustion vehicles in favor of more expensive, less powerful and less durable electric cars. Here is my solution, build 5000 5 Gigawatt Gen 4 nuclear power plants across the United States, build 1000 desalination plants along the east and west Coast, built aquaducts to move much of that water to middle America and it's farmlands and people, use a large amount of that power to convert less efficient coal into more efficient crude oil, take millions of acres of unused land and reforest them with trees, plants and wildlife and remove any regulations preventing people from building their own personal solar panels and wind turbines on their own property. Problem solved.
@parismarx Or maybe we should invest more into nuclear energy. It doesn't matter how much energy you are using if that energy is being generated through sustainable means.
@parismarx But .. but.. but think of all that AI grifter money! When the planet is dead and everything burnt to the ground the heaps of money still exist!
All these large corps keep doing the same things and there is no consequences for them except basically a scolding...
speaking of, I'm tired of going to the recycle center and having staff treat me like the pollution situation is my fault.
OMG they watch where you put the various plastics like they were the plastic Nazis....
They should be encouraging people to recycle, not discourage them.
@parismarx As much as I hate the current AI craze and the massive amount of energy that is required to power it, isn’t an increase in emissions over 5 years too long to fully attribute to the genAI shit show? Both Google and Microsoft have heavily expanded their Cloud business in the last 5 years, hosting massively more workloads for their customers.
@parismarx make it a law that data farms/servers/ AI/ crypto CAN NOT use the electricity grid. They must supply their own renewable power. Any excess power can be sold to the grid at same price that individuals can sell their excess power for.
Problem solved.
And if AI and crypto finally tank then the renewable power can all be sold to the grid at a reasonable price (same price homeowners can sell their excess power for)