this post was submitted on 22 Mar 2024
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AI’s excessive water consumption threatens to drown out its environmental contributions, researchers say (theconversation.com)
submitted 7 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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Cross-posted from: https://feddit.de/post/10267315

Initial research shows that AI has a significant water footprint. It uses water both for cooling the servers that power its computations and for producing the energy it consumes. As AI becomes more integrated into our societies, its water footprint will inevitably grow.

The growth of ChatGPT and similar AI models has been hailed as “the new Google.” But while a single Google search requires half a millilitre of water in energy, ChatGPT consumes 500 millilitres of water for every five to 50 prompts.

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[–] [email protected] 22 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (17 children)

So when computer systems use water, it's typically in a closed cooling loop. The water is heated by the computer components and then cooled in a radiator before being returned to the computer components to absorb more heat and the cycle repeats.
So why do these articles always read like it's consuming water in a way that eliminates it from existence?
As far as I'm aware they're not taking water and turning it into something else like concrete, so what exactly is happening that it's reducing our fresh water supply on Earth?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 7 months ago (2 children)

If you're taking water and putting it in a closed loop, you're effectively removing it from the natural water cycle until you remove it from said closed loop, no?

I agree the articles make it sound more like they are just burning water out of existence lol.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago

I guess they put in perspective the scarcity of water and the increased usage of AI in the near future...

[–] [email protected] 0 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

Right, but the way the article is worded it makes it sound like they're adding 500 mL of water to the loop every single time you enter a prompt.

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