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In a first, Google has released data on how much energy an AI prompt uses
(www.technologyreview.com)
this post was submitted on 21 Aug 2025
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There are zero downsides when mentally associating an energy hog with "1 second of use time of the device that is routinely used for minutes at a time."
https://xkcd.com/1035/
With regard to sugar: when I started counting calories I discovered that the actual amounts of calories in certain foods were not what I intuitively assumed. Some foods turned out to be much less unhealthy than I thought. For example, I can eat almost three pints of ice cream a day and not gain weight (as long as I don't eat anything else). So sometimes instead of eating a normal dinner, I want to eat a whole pint of ice cream and I can do so guilt-free.
Likewise, I use both AI and a microwave, my energy use from AI in a day is apparently less than the energy I use to reheat a cup of tea, so the conclusion that I can use AI however much I want to without significantly affecting my environmental impact is the correct one.
Individually you’re spot on. Your AI use doesn’t matter. But, and this is where companies tend to leave off, when you take into account how many millions (or billions) of times something is done in a day (like AI prompts), then that’s when it genuinely matters.
To me, this is akin to companies trying to pass the blame to consumers when it’s the companies themselves who are the biggest climate offenders.
I don't see why this argument works better against AI than it does against microwaves. Those are used hundreds of millions of times a day too.
You’re right. But if I had to pick a why, I’d go with how microwaves at least provide a service for households by heating up food.
AI’s only viable service (at the time of this writing) is a replacement for viagra for techbros when they need to get an erection.