AI and the environment

[Callmeback]

I know that AI is bad for the environment but I'm not sure if it's all AI. For example if I now Google something an AI answer pops up at the top despite not asking an AI tool. Is that poor for the environment too? If it is, how can we stop that option. I do use AI occasionally but try to not ask for daft things because I'm mindful that we already destroy our planet far more than we should.

It’s scaremongering. AI compute uses electricity and water but so does literally everything else. Mumsnet is running on a server consuming electricity and water right now.

As someone in a developed country your impact on the environment already is orders of magnitude larger than some AI tasks

It's not scaremongering. A single message/ response to an AI model uses 10x what a Google search does. A chat could easily have 10x messages than I would seats google for because you need a full interaction.

So that's probably 100 times now use. And people are turning to the technology more.

They aren't going to be just used for people finding information but also bots. It is significant. Which means it won't just be stopped by you cutting back. Others are using it on your behalf