AI's insatiable appetite: How Big Tech’s energy demands endanger Europe’s climate goals

Did you know that Google’s AI energy demands have driven its emissions up nearly 50% in five years? Big Tech likes to claim that they only use green energy. But this is nothing more than creative emissions accounting, the reality is AI is largely powered by fossil fuels. The big problem is: growth projections show that it might only get worse from here. Across the globe, resource-hungry data centers are springing up to develop and run massive AI models. Europe’s emissions could skyrocket if we don’t take action. This talk uncovers the full energy demands of generative AI across its value chain and explains how these demands could jeopardize the renewable energy transition, raise emissions and fuel our fossil dependence.

This programme session is supported by Stiftung Mercator. / Dieser Programmpunkt wird durch die Stiftung Mercator unterstützt.