[LUM#22] AI’s Energy Hunger: A Blessing in Disguise?
The deployment of AI is contributing to the rapid growth of the digital sector’s environmental footprint. In the face of criticism, the sector is aiming for quick wins to achieve carbon neutrality. These promises still need to be proven.
The deployment of AI is increasing the digital sector’s environmental footprint. This is hardly surprising, given that AI derives its performance from processing ever-larger volumes of data, which causes computing demands to skyrocket. This, in turn, leads to a proliferation of processors and data centers, whose operations are driving up the sector’s energy consumption. According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), the electricity needed to power AI and cryptocurrencies is expected to double between 2022 and 2026.
“The model training phase is the most energy-intensive. Training ChatGPT-3 is said to have consumed 1,300 megawatt-hours—200 times more than the annual energy consumption of a French household. Given that improving an AI model requires repeating this training phase several times… A query—also known as the inference phase—consumes ten times more energy than a typical Google search,” explains Edmond Baranes, a researcher at the Montpellier Research Laboratory in Economics (MRE1).
A Race to Invest in AI
This energy consumption contributes to the sector’s growing carbon footprint. Greenhouse gas emissions from the digital sector are projected to triple by 2050, according to the business-as-usual scenario outlined in a joint report by the French Environment and Energy Management Agency (ADEME) and the French Regulatory Authority for Electronic Communications, Postal Services, and Press Distribution (ARCEP) published in March 2023. And frugality is not on the agenda. “No one is considering reducing the digital sector’s energy consumption, ” confirms Edmond Baranes. One reason is that the business model of the digital giants—the MAMAA (Microsoft, Amazon, Meta, Apple, and Alphabet)—is based precisely on data. “There’s a race to invest in AI because mastering it means generating more data—and therefore more value, ” explains the economist, who has been studying digital markets for years, with a particular focus on the relationships between telecom operators and digital content providers.
Faced with criticism of its high energy consumption, the sector has two responses. First, technological innovations to reduce the energy consumption of computing systems. “The arrival of a new generation of processors that consume less energy than GPUs ( TPUs, NPUs, etc.), as well as improvements in algorithms—which are faster and more efficient—will enhance the energy efficiency of AI, ” notes Edmond Baranes. Nevertheless, energy consumption will continue to rise, particularly due to the “rebound effect,” a well-known phenomenon that describes the persistence of negative impacts even as technology improves. The use of renewable energy to power data centers is also widely promoted by the MAMAA. Carbon neutrality in the sector remains, for now, a pipe dream. Microsoft committed in 2020 to achieving negative emissions by 2030, but by 2024 its emissions had increased by 30% (Le Monde, June 15, 2024).
Finding the Right Metrics
AI should also contribute indirectly to reducing our consumption. A 2022 OECD report thus touts the “dual transition”—green and digital—based on the idea that products and services delivered by AI are sources of efficiency gains and thus energy savings, by helping to manage energy systems (“smart grids”) or by improving the optimization of transportation and mobility networks. However, these gains must be weighed against other negative effects of AI deployment, such as the increase in certain “recreational” uses—which rely heavily on the generation of text, images, and videos—and which consume more and more energy.
“Today, even though discussions are underway, the expertise needed to assess energy savings related to AI has not yet been firmly established. An initiative by Ademe and Arcep aims precisely to conduct an annual survey on sustainable digital technology in order to track changes in energy consumption in the digital sector. “The key challenge is to identify the right indicators and adapt them in line with technological advances,” notes Edmond Baranes.
In the meantime, the sector is not subject to any very strict restrictions on its energy consumption. “There are general policy guidelines on corporate digital responsibility, with incentives that can be incorporated into their CSR initiatives, but there are no targets for reducing consumption. Fortunately, corporate initiatives are emerging around green computing, data center optimization, and efforts in sustainable product design and recycling, ” notes Edmond Baranes. The European Union passed an AI regulation in late May 2024, the world’s first binding law on artificial intelligence. “The text lists digital services by risk level, but the attention given to energy consumption is very limited.”
A tiered pricing structure for digital services based on data usage also does not seem to be on the table at this time. Even though telecom operators must manage network capacity and, therefore, monitor content providers’ demand for data traffic. “The few awareness campaigns encouraging users to stream during off-peak hours address this concern on the part of operators. But today, any restriction on Internet access is unlikely to gain traction, as many would perceive it as an infringement on a fundamental freedom, ” the economist concludes.
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- MRE (UM)
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