Internet pollutes. Every time you look mobileWhen you chat with a friend or watch videos of kittens, you are sending signals to a server to process that information. Your online life depends on three million data centers There are buildings housing farms scattered around the world computers People who work tirelessly 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Keeping the network running requires enormous storage capacity and computing power. And all of this is fueled by insatiable consumption. energy.
It is estimated that data centers and transmission networks now represent more than 3% of global IT spending. electricAccording to the International Energy Agency. This figure could rise to 4% by 2030, driven by increasing energy demand driven by the rise of artificial intelligence (AI). digitization and calculation cloudy. More than half of the industry is controlled by large technology companies. Amazon, Microsoft anyone GoogleIts largest facilities have an energy absorption capacity of approximately 198 megawatts (MW), enough to power approximately 150,000 homes in the United States.
“These companies will make such an abnormally high return on their profits that they do not care about the energy expenditure this entails. This means huge damage to the environment,” he explains to EL PERIÓDICO. Ulises Cortesscientific coordinator artificial intelligence Barcelona Supercomputing Center
more pollution
These high-intensity processes pollution. technology Digital accounts for 1.4% to 5.9% of these. emissions spherical greenhouse gasesAccording to analysis by the World Economic Forum (IMF). Even so, it must be said that climate crisis continues to be a direct result of exploitation. fossil fuelsThis accounts for almost 80% of the entire planet’s energy demand.
Storing billions of data and processing them to accommodate global connectivity requires a lot of energy. However, approximately 40% of the electricity needed by data centers is used not to perform these calculations, but to power transmission systems. cooling through fans that keep these areas at a certain level heat Optimal between 20 and 22 degrees. This prevents overheating, which can damage servers, but also accelerates carbon dioxide emissions (CO2).
More efficiency
This climate impact is alarming. Greenpeace nevertheless pointed out that the solution is not to cut off the internet, but to feed the centers. renewable energy. Amazon, AimMicrosoft and Google are the companies that invest the most in clean resources, especially solar and wind.
European Union The (EU) has chosen this green path, but with a code of conduct that is voluntary and does not impose obligations on the giants of the industry. “Unless there is regulation that forces tech companies to become more sustainable, they will continue to do business without us having access to data on their impact,” he warns. Ana ValdiviaResearcher and professor in Artificial Intelligence, Governance and Policy at the Oxford Internet Institute.
The industry is ensuring that centers are increasingly efficient. This has ensured that energy consumptions have remained more or less constant, even as data traffic has increased by 15 percent and storage by 40 percent over the last decade. “The impact will be greater if the demand for centers and energy is greater, as much as they are sustainable,” warns Valdivia.