Data Centers consume 3% of Global electricity
By Julie Peller, Ph.D.
Green Junction
The article by Steve Santamaria in Dataversity earlier this year described data centers and their environmental impact. “Data centers are the backbone of our digital lives. They store our photographs, host our websites, run our cloud-based software, and stream our favorite movies. They are indispensable, yet their environmental costs are often overlooked. Data centers serve our appetite for digital consumption – a need that is growing exponentially in the age of artificial intelligence (A.I.), machine learning (ML), and remote work.” Data centers are currently consuming about 3% of global electricity and are predicted to require up to 10% by 2030.
The increasing demand for energy for our digital lives comes from several computing processes. According to a recent Wall Street Journal article, the energy required for a typical Google search is 0.3 watt-hours, significantly less than the energy for a search by the popular A.I. chatbot ChatGPT, which requires more computing. The A.I. search consumes 2.9 watt-hours - nearly ten times more than the Google search. The International Energy Agency has determined that the additional energy demand from these advanced computer systems is almost 10 TWh (1 trillion watt-hours)/year.
The United States EPA’s Energy Star website explains that cryptocurrency transactions, which rely on computer computations of complex mathematical problems, utilize vast amounts of energy. “A single crypto transaction consumes more energy than that required to power 6 houses for a day in the U.S.” The current global energy consumption of the cryptocurrency market is estimated at over 69 TWh/ year. This amount of energy is similar to “19 coal fired power plants operating continuously.” Since the computations become more complex over time, the energy requirements for cryptocurrency are predicted to grow 5-fold.
Additionally, data centers require large areas of land, emit noise around the clock, and potentially release air toxins. Their water-based cooling systems require enormous amounts of water. One analysis determined that a half-liter of water is required for just 5 to 50 answers from ChatGPT. Data centers also require copper metal, which the U.S. Department of Energy listed as a critical mineral last year; it is in high demand and is currently sourced through mining.
Numerous ways exist to reduce the negative environmental impacts of data centers, and we will highlight these next week.
Julie Peller, Ph.D., is an environmental chemist (Professor of Chemistry at Valparaiso University ). She has been writing a weekly column called The Green Junction for the past seven years and is helping to move the call of Laudato Si to action forward. Her Research Interests are advanced oxidation for aqueous solutions, water quality analyses, emerging contaminants, air quality analyses, Lake Michigan shoreline challenges (Cladophora, water, and sediment contaminants), and student and citizen participation in environmental work.