While Google and Amazon promise a sustainable future, their reports reveal a record increase in carbon emissions. The uncontrolled expansion of artificial intelligence requires a huge amount of energy, and these companies prioritize their economic profits. Citizens will end up paying the cost in health and climate, while big tech companies greenwash with unfulfilled green goals.
Data centers: the technological Achilles' heel 🌍
Each query to a generative AI model consumes up to ten times more electricity than a traditional search. Google and Amazon are not investing enough in renewable energy to offset their growth. The technical solution requires demanding that each new data center be tied to its own solar or wind farm. Without real sanctions from governments, these companies will continue using fossil fuels to power their artificial intelligence machinery.
The algorithm of cynicism: I promise and then I emit 🤖
It turns out that artificial intelligence not only hallucinates answers, but also hallucinates climate commitments. Google and Amazon sell us the sustainability story while their servers literally smoke. Perhaps the next thing will be a virtual assistant that explains how to plant trees in the Arctic while it melts from the heat of its processors. Less greenwashing and more solar panels.