Google’s carbon emissions have soared by 51% since 2019 as artificial intelligence hampers the tech company’s efforts to go green.
While the corporation has invested in renewable energy and carbon removal technology, it has failed to curb its scope 3 emissions, which are those further down the supply chain, and are in large part influenced by a growth in datacentre capacity required to power artificial intelligence.
The company reported a 27% increase in year-on-year electricity consumption as it struggles to decarbonise as quickly as its energy needs increase.
Datacentres play a crucial role in training and operating the models that underpin AI models such as Google’s Gemini and OpenAI’s GPT-4, which powers the ChatGPT chatbot. The International Energy Agency estimates that datacentres’ total electricity consumption could double from 2022 levels to 1,000TWh (terawatt hours) in 2026, approximately Japan’s level of electricity demand. AI will result in datacentres using 4.5% of global energy generation by 2030, according to calculations by the research firm SemiAnalysis.
If Google had built nucler power plants 10-years ago, there would be zero emissions. If California had done it instead there would also be zero-emissions, if the federal government had built nuclear power plants we’d also be at zero emissions. If all anti-nuclear people had killed themselves in 1979 we’d be net negative with emissions.
Practically unlimited demand is fine if the source doesn’t use fossil fuels to begin with, so I don’t see how this is an “AI” problem. It is, of course, a capitalism problem though.