AI’s Impact On Energy, Water Resources Is Huge: Jacobin

While the mass adoption of AI has transformed digital life seemingly overnight, regulators have fallen asleep on the job of curtailing AI data centers’ drain on energy and water resources, Lois Parshley wrote in a detailed analysis for Jacobin.

Federal agencies like the US Energy Information Administration, which collects information about industries’ energy use, aren’t tracking the demand of the data centers that enable AI — even as their footprint skyrockets.

Alex de Vries, the founder of Digiconomist, a research company exploring the unintended consequences of digital trends, says AI requires 10 times the power consumption of a traditional Google search.

De Vries calculates that adding AI-generated answers to all Google searches could easily consume as much electricity as Ireland.

Federal agencies like the US Energy Information Administration, which collects information about industries’ energy use, aren’t tracking the demand of the data centers that enable AI — even as their footprint skyrockets.

Data centers are rapidly outgrowing the electric grid while keeping dirty sources of power, like coal plants, operating.

Tech companies also have a long track record of arranging for special, discounted rates for their massive power consumption — which means in many cases, ratepayers like you are subsidizing data centers’ undisclosed energy use.

These facilities suck up huge volumes of water to cool their servers and are often located in places where land is cheap — like deserts.

Only a few operators report their water usage, even though 20% of servers draw water “from moderately to highly stressed watersheds.” One paper estimates that globally, the demand for water for data centers could be half that of the United Kingdom within the next several years.