One million Blackwell GPUs would suck down an astonishing 1.875 gigawatts of power. For context, a typical nuclear power plant only produces 1 gigawatt of power.
Fossil fuel-burning plants, whether that’s natural gas, coal, or oil, produce even less. There’s no way to ramp up nuclear capacity in the time it will take to supply these millions of chips, so much, if not all, of that extra power demand is going to come from carbon-emitting sources.
Using tons of energy isn’t a problem, as long as it’s carbon neutral (or negative). The problem is that we are simply not there yet. Taxing carbon is a great solution and would nearly immediately fix the problem (on the scale of years, not decades).
That energy should go to more useful-to-society purposes, first. If all the “AI” datacenters are running on green power and the rest of us are still burning coal, then that’s green power that’s still wasted. It’s even more of a slap in the face if taxpayer funds go toward the costs of building any of those single-purpose green energy projects.
Bingo, same argument I’ve had to bring up with crypto bros, if it’s using green energy that could be used to power essential things that are powered by fossil fuel then it’s green energy that we’re wasting. All these projects should be put on hold until we’re running on 100% green energy and we produce enough surplus that we can afford to use it for non essentials.
Seems like the smart move would make a mandate that any AI data center that wants to activate needs to provide its own power from wind and solar, or at least build or contribute to an existing wind and solar plant on the same grid to offset their estimated power consumption watt for watt.
Same issue, why shouldn’t we use that to replace fossil fuel elsewhere instead? The land they’re using to produce green energy could be used to do the same but for essential needs instead.
I see what you’re saying, and I get that I’m in the fuck AI magazine.
Funny, I hadn’t even noticed myself 😂