How the surging demand for energy and rise of AI is straining the power grid in the U.S.

CBS News ^ | July 19, 2024 | Ben Tracy

[McGruff]

The surging demand for energy in the U.S. is growing significantly for the first time in decades. Experts say it is forecast to hit record highs both this year and next year — creating more planet-warming emissions.

Part of the demand is due to an increasing number of data centers across the country, along with the rise of artificial intelligence.

The nation's roughly 2,700 data centers are mostly run by big tech firms like Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Meta and Apple, and consumed more than 4% of all electricity in the U.S. in 2022. It's projected to more than double to 9% by 2030, according to the Electric Power Research Institute, a research organization and nonprofit focused on energy. It is not affiliated with any companies or type of technology.

But it's already taxing the U.S.' aging power grid, and the demands of AI are just beginning to grow. A ChatGPT query, for example, uses nearly 10 times the electricity of a typical internet search.

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TOPICS: Business/Economy; News/Current Events
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[jmacusa]

You don’t think letting in 13 million illegal aliens wouldn’t have anything to do with it, do you?

[oldtech]

Someone might explain to me why we need EVs or AI when the power grid will hardly handle what we’ve got. Where I live (small town) we have more & more short term power blackouts with no explanations as a rule. I have to wonder if the grid is going down because someone thinks they need power elsewhere for EVs or whatever. Sorry, I don’t accept that as a reasonable excuse( we have only a very few EVs here) for cutting off my power. Some stuff in my house has to be reset & I was here before EVs & AI. Hard to say what this does to any electric motors that have to restart automatically. Is the power company going to replace these when the time comes along with accompanying expenses? This would be mainly a refririgerator, deep freeze, & A/C unit. Multiply those numbers for that equipment by the number of units affected & it would be sizeable.

[oldtech]

I might add that we had a power disruption last winter here that was quite noticeable in it’s length. It was cold & if you were most folks, that meant no heat. As I recall, it lasted several hours. Did we get a reduced rate that month for the considerable inconvenience? Yeah, sure. You bet.

[blackdog]

There is political action, and there is the right thing to do, action. Engineering only works with the second of the two. If you choose the first, things go to $hit rather quickly.