this post was submitted on 04 Jul 2024
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The leap in emissions is largely due to energy-guzzling data centers and supply chain emissions necessary to power artificial intelligence (AI) systems such as Google’s Gemini and OpenAI’s ChatGPT. The report estimated that in 2023, Google’s data centers alone account for up to 10% of global data center electricity consumption. Their data center electricity and water consumption both increased 17% between 2022 and 2023.

Google released 14.3 million metric tons of carbon dioxide just last year, 13% higher than the year before.

Climate scientists have shown concerns as Big Tech giants such as Google, Amazon and Microsoft continue to invest billons of dollars into AI.

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[–] SirEDCaLot@lemmy.today 3 points 1 day ago

50% more energy so it can tell me to superglue my pizza together and jump off the Golden Gate Bridge? Not seeing the value.
There should be an AI-free 'eco' option... I can live without the AI.

[–] pyre@lemmy.world 11 points 2 days ago

BUT YOU PLEBS BETTER NOT TURN ON THE AC

[–] Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world 130 points 3 days ago (7 children)

So, lets get this straight. Humans are going to die. Animals are going to die. Plants are going to die.

...........so that corporations can make a few easier dollars before this whole planet burns in flames?

Yes, corporationS. Plural. What? You think google is the only one using AI?

[–] Empricorn@feddit.nl 91 points 3 days ago

Literally not a single person on the planet thinks Google is the only one using AI. Agree with the rest though...

[–] Dasnap@lemmy.world 22 points 3 days ago

It's so we can make silly AI songs to send to each other :)

[–] ShittyBeatlesFCPres@lemmy.world 6 points 2 days ago (1 children)

I agree with everything except that A.I. doesn’t make money and may never solve a problem important enough to justify the cost.

[–] naught101@lemmy.world 2 points 2 days ago

What problem would it solve?

[–] FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.world 11 points 3 days ago (2 children)

I mean, yeah.

One of the hallmarks of our species is its insatiable, irrational greed.

[–] naught101@lemmy.world 3 points 2 days ago

That's a hall mark of our civilisation/society, not our species. Humans have been around for hundreds of thousands of years, and the vast majority of cultures in that time have been relatively stable, with checks on excessive greed.

(see Graeber and Wengrow's The Dawn Of Everything for some good examples.)

[–] niartenyaw@midwest.social 4 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

and that's unfortunately only true because the greedy groups have destroyed all the non-greedy ones by slaughter or forced participation

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[–] _sideffect@lemmy.world 75 points 3 days ago (2 children)

But by all means, everyone don't use plastic straws! You're killing the environment!

[–] androogee@midwest.social 24 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Yeah dawg we can't possibly do two things that are good for the environment, we have to pick one. Everyone knows that.

[–] Holzkohlen@feddit.de 16 points 2 days ago (1 children)

I pick guillotining the rich as my one thing

[–] naught101@lemmy.world 3 points 2 days ago

What about choking them with plastic straws?

[–] evolvor@sh.itjust.works 10 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Plastic straws are harmful to sea turtles. That is why their use has been reduced.

Do you like turtles?

[–] Couldbealeotard@lemmy.world 10 points 2 days ago (2 children)

I know this is true, but I find it bizarre that there's this fixation on straws and not the hundred other things we are likely doing that also kills turtles.

It's like someone saw that viral video of the turtle with a straw up it's nose and decided that's the only thing to focus on.

[–] barsoap@lemm.ee 4 points 2 days ago

Detractors have that fixation on straws, for the EU legislature it was just another regulation among many.

Also the plastic straw fixation is now kinda fading in favour of attached bottle caps. People will literally lose 50 IQ points and stub their nose to spite Berlaymont instead of rotating the bottle 90 degrees.

[–] JasonDJ@lemmy.zip 4 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)

I bought this like, prepared meal thing. It was like curry or something. Packaged, shelf stable. It harked on eco-friendly packaging. I figured, I've gotten curry before that was in a foil bag which I assume is easily recyclable. Probably something like that, right?

Every component was individually plastic wrapped. Even the bowl. Except for the bamboo "spoon". That was wrapped in paper. I put "spoon" in quotes because it was vaguely spoon shaped and functioned more like an oat from a rowboat.

Like, was this just a piss poor attempt at green washing?

[–] Couldbealeotard@lemmy.world 2 points 2 days ago

No straw though, right? You're in the clear.

[–] TheGrandNagus@lemmy.world 101 points 3 days ago (1 children)

These companies 100% said they'd be carbon neutral by 2030 in order to take the wind out of the sails of people pushing for carbon taxes, rather than because they actually intended on doing it.

[–] Frozengyro@lemmy.world 26 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Could be the other way as well. Prepare to become carbon neutral in order to have less tax burden. But once that fell though, they didn't care again. The only way they will be carbon neutral is if governments make it more expensive for them to not be.

[–] TheGrandNagus@lemmy.world 23 points 3 days ago

Yup. The one thing that is certain is that you cannot just leave companies to self-regulate.

[–] naught101@lemmy.world 11 points 2 days ago

Anti correlated with search quality

[–] ogmios@sh.itjust.works 59 points 3 days ago (1 children)

It would seem that we shall be requiring you peasants to give up another 10% of your daily carbon footprint to meet the demands of our new machine overlord.

[–] NaibofTabr@infosec.pub 9 points 3 days ago

to meet the demands of our new machine ~~overlord~~ dunsel

[–] fluxc0@lemmy.world 41 points 3 days ago

who would have guessed the giant corporation would have lied about something, because we haven’t been lied to before.

[–] slaacaa@lemmy.world 43 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Time to use less paper straws, folks #weareinthistogether🌎

[–] MeatPilot@lemmy.world 27 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

I turn off my lights when I'm not in a room and don't own a server farm. #doingmypart🌳

[–] Imgonnatrythis@sh.itjust.works 27 points 3 days ago

I realized the reading lights on my private jet were all incandescent. Recently flew it to Italy and had them swapped out there for LED.

[–] kenkenken@sh.itjust.works 38 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Net-zero in 2030 is a lie. Google, Microsoft, whoever, - doesn't matter. It's only five years left. I don't even think that bigcop can go from increasing carbon emissions to decreasing before 2030.

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[–] ToucheGoodSir@lemy.lol 8 points 2 days ago

Classic corporate behavior. Get market share, enshittify (Enshittification) for quarterly profits. At the expense of their users. What a waste.

[–] HotsauceHurricane@lemmy.one 6 points 2 days ago

Surprising nobody.

[–] Alphane_Moon@lemmy.world 24 points 3 days ago

The stuff about tech companies going carbon neutral or whatever was such bullshit. It was clear this was mostly PR and if there was a need to massively increase carbon emissions (as happened with current "AI" trends), they wouldn't think twice.

[–] JohnDClay@sh.itjust.works 17 points 3 days ago (1 children)

I wonder if this is taking into account the energy mix of the particular data centers, or just using the average energy mix?

[–] Humanius@lemmy.world 23 points 3 days ago (6 children)

Sadly it's tricky to separate the two.

Say if hypothethically we have a data center that is not connected to the grid, and is entirely running on solar power and battery storage.
If the grid still generates (part of) its electricity need using fossil fuels, those same solar panels and batteries could instead have been used to (further) decarbonize the grid.

While using solar power is good, increasing the overall unnecessary electricity consumption is still not great.

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[–] morementum@lemmy.fosshost.com 18 points 3 days ago

Speed running two apocalypse fronts.

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