Eleanor Saitta on Nostr: Global data center energy use is set to triple this year, from 15TWh last year to ...
Global data center energy use is set to triple this year, from 15TWh last year to 46TWh this year.
That's an increase on the order of what Serbia or Ireland consumes in a year.
Given that most of this demand is being driven by Nvidia GPU systems for AI compute and Nvidia is manufacturing capacity limited right now, with all available hardware being installed, we can expect that growth rate to continue, adding another ~30TWh next year — except that the next generation of hardware consumes even more power, so it could be more like an additional 40TWh, another Denmark or New Zealand. If Nvidia gets over their supply chain crunch, this could go much higher, assuming the market and grid can support it. Even with only linear growth, this would put us at ~285TWh by 2030, approximately the same as all of the UK.
It won't, of course — it's an obvious bubble and the infrastructure simply isn't there to support this, but it's a catastrophe in the making regardless.
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/us-electric-utilities-brace-surge-power-demand-data-centers-2024-04-10/
That's an increase on the order of what Serbia or Ireland consumes in a year.
Given that most of this demand is being driven by Nvidia GPU systems for AI compute and Nvidia is manufacturing capacity limited right now, with all available hardware being installed, we can expect that growth rate to continue, adding another ~30TWh next year — except that the next generation of hardware consumes even more power, so it could be more like an additional 40TWh, another Denmark or New Zealand. If Nvidia gets over their supply chain crunch, this could go much higher, assuming the market and grid can support it. Even with only linear growth, this would put us at ~285TWh by 2030, approximately the same as all of the UK.
It won't, of course — it's an obvious bubble and the infrastructure simply isn't there to support this, but it's a catastrophe in the making regardless.
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/us-electric-utilities-brace-surge-power-demand-data-centers-2024-04-10/