The water argument is way overblown. Even based on the worst figures from the article "OpenAI’s older model would be using 31 million liters of water per day, or 8.18 million gallons" - this is 2 billion gallons of water per year. A single Californian pistachio grower uses 130 billion gallons a year, likely more than the entire AI industry, for quite a niche crop. Don't even think about the water usage of staples like cotton or beef.
Also, before the AI boom there were still huge numbers of GPUs using the same water and power that AI was using to run things like Netflix and YouTube (not exactly vital for human existence) - and still are - yet AI is treated like unique sin against the environment.
The irony is quite striking, just as ChatGPT can generate confident-sounding but inaccurate information, Altman appears to be presenting unsubstantiated claims about his company’s environmental impact. Both involve presenting information without reliable backing, though the consequences differ - one misleads users in conversations, the other potentially misleads stakeholders and the public about environmental responsibility.
The article is a bit weird - says lies are growing bolder, then Altman says "0.000085 gallons of water" per query and then calculates that's 31 million gallons per year. Which is quite a lot of water but doesn't show Altman is lying.
It seems more the author doesn't like Altman and is trying to show he's lying but is not doing a very good job at doing so.
And other bollocks - Altman advocates UBI but knows it won't work and then links an article not showing that. I think the article much more convincingly shows Gizmodo lying than Altman, not that I especially trust the latter.
The environmental story about AI is extremely boring and I wish it would stop being brought up.
Every technological development since the industrial revolution has increased human demand for energy in some way. It's only the environmental movement, which actively shut down nuclear power plants, which wants human energy consumption to be reduced for cultish reasons.
If we'd ignored anti-nuclear activists in the 70s none of this would be a problem.
The pro-nuclear cult is certainly irritating. Still stuck on a technology which can't help us much in the current climate predicament (too slow to build, too expensive) and which we repeatedly failed to manage.
The environmental movement isn't in charge. The world community (through mostly democratic elected governments) has decided to reduce emmissions to Net Zero, not energy usage.
> The pro-nuclear cult is certainly irritating. Still stuck on a technology which can't help us much in the current climate predicament (too slow to build, too expensive) and which we repeatedly failed to manage.
An important point is that while we can and should maximize renewable sources as dominating energy sources, we still need stable backup for fluctuations - for days where there is little wind and little sun. We don't yet have practical energy storage technologies that would allow us to eliminate this problem.
The sun doesn't always shine and the wind doesn't always blow. What is your solution then, burn coal and oil? Nuclear has a great role to fill the gap reliably.
…and the green movement don’t realise they’re being the useful idiots of the fossil fuel industries, who have been using this attack line for decades because they didn’t want the competition.
If you keep putting off building because it’s “too slow to build”, then guess what - it never gets built.
Would you care to try to reconcile “too expensive” with “you can’t put a price on the planet”?
And nice try with the democratic angle, but the truth more like we have a growing world population with a growing need for abundant, reliable, affordable energy. And yet we’re held hostage by the luxury beliefs of a tiny minority who feel they have a right to govern and want to bask in their perceived virtue.
Yeah, but the nuclear waste would be a problem. The cost would be a problem too.
I don't get why some people won't get that nuclear is not the solution to the energy problem. Nuclear is one of the most expensive energy sources, and that's without the cost of long term storage of burnt fuel. Without the cost of health issues in mining areas.
The call for energy consumption reduction is not "for cultish reasons", it's because of climate change that's already screwing us.
It's just the fact that renewables aren't enough (since it's not always windy or sunny) and storage just isn't cheap or plentiful enough. They're great in many ways, but they alone won't provide enough power and stability.
So you're left with water power (which is only applicable in few areas and they destroy the nature), coal/oil/gas (which are much worse for the environment) and nuclear energy.
Nuclear might not solve everything itself either, but it's definitely part of the solution.
I agree with you on the technical part. We would likely be in better shape if we advanced more in this area and built more power plants.
But to dismiss environmentalists like this is a bit simplistic.
Remember how long it took for climate change issues to establish in the mainstream?
Corporations and political groups have been fighting and suppressing these issues since the start.
We still don’t have serious discussions about this in large portions of society.
In a more ideal world, nuclear would have been continously integrated and improved to a larger degree. But that would have required for serious discussion in the first place.
Using the environmental impact of AI as an argument against AI is ridiculous because AI currently consumes at least an order of magnitude less energy than, say, the computer games industry, which is of no concern apparently.
At least some of the anti-nuclear movement back then was directed against old and unsafe nuclear plants, and for good reason. These activists achieved their goal, as modern plants are very safe.
AFAICT, modern day anti-nuclear movement is a bit different to that.
It's a cost-benefit discussion, should we really boil the oceans so you can show yourself as a Ghibli cartoon to your friends and be relevant for 3 minutes?
This water debate reminds me of a science fiction project, Chain://Universe. Their latest story, Web://Reflect, explores a future where thinking itself has a resource cost. In that 2090s world, consciousness runs on blockchain ("Mental Smart Chain"), and every cognitive process burns "Gas" (paid in MSCoin). It's a stark look at how tech monopolies could commodify existence, where even basic thought becomes a luxury. The underlying theory (IPWT) offers a fascinating, verifiable take on digital consciousness. Worth a peek if resource allocation in tech futures interests you.
Is this a kind of new measurement with the water consumption? The water flows back, gets purified and into the system again. In this case it does not even get dirty. Should it not be just extra energy consumption, to purify the water, instead of it’s own metric?
Unfortunately the moment the environment and energy are involved, journalism falls apart. "Water consumption" is a meaningless metric if it 's not accompanied by other information - location, energy intensity of water, source of water, where the water goes next. None of this stuff is ever included.
A mill next to a river "consumes" the water that turns its wheel, but then immediately releases it back into the river. That's very different to a cooling tower that turns that water into vapour and releases it into the air. Which is the data centre doing?
Assuming the data centre isn't actively depleting groundwater, the only important number is how much energy it consumes (including for water related activities). Perhaps also power per unit of compute.
In a lot of places in the world, using water for cooling is likely to be more efficient than an equivalent heat pump - so should be celebrated!
Water usage in humid regions is not a problem (and not nearly as efficient for cooling). Is a problem when consumption gets so high that ground water levels change or fossile ground water is used.
Look (literally with eyes) at Ashburn on a humid morning. Above the datacenters providing the "cloud" are literal clouds of condensation from the evaporative coolers, and bigger ones at the local power plants providing the electricity.
More often than not, potable water is drawn up and then literally evaporated.
So from the practical perspective of everybody else who happens to need water from the pipe/aquifer/lake/snowmelt, it's "gone" just as much as if it were dumped into the sea.
Hmm I see. I thought it was tab water running through cooling tubes and back into the sink.
If they actually pump free water from source around their location and release it back how they want to, the points about water consumption are definitely legit.
You can't really re-circulate the same water or else it needs to be cooled again, and dumping it back will destroy wildlife. Fishes especially are very sensitive to temperature swings in the water.
Is the entire basis of claiming he’s lying the disagreement between his figures and external estimates? It’s pretty bold to dismiss the person who is actually in possession of solid information in favour of external estimates made in the absence of information.
I think it's more about the person's own credibility. It's not the first time he throws out very bold claims, despite being in possession of "solid information", as you say.
Readit News
Also, before the AI boom there were still huge numbers of GPUs using the same water and power that AI was using to run things like Netflix and YouTube (not exactly vital for human existence) - and still are - yet AI is treated like unique sin against the environment.
Do you mean a particular farm, or “any” farmer in the abstract?
https://www.forbes.com/sites/michelatindera/2021/11/21/how-m...
Deleted Comment
It seems more the author doesn't like Altman and is trying to show he's lying but is not doing a very good job at doing so.
And other bollocks - Altman advocates UBI but knows it won't work and then links an article not showing that. I think the article much more convincingly shows Gizmodo lying than Altman, not that I especially trust the latter.
Every technological development since the industrial revolution has increased human demand for energy in some way. It's only the environmental movement, which actively shut down nuclear power plants, which wants human energy consumption to be reduced for cultish reasons.
If we'd ignored anti-nuclear activists in the 70s none of this would be a problem.
The environmental movement isn't in charge. The world community (through mostly democratic elected governments) has decided to reduce emmissions to Net Zero, not energy usage.
An important point is that while we can and should maximize renewable sources as dominating energy sources, we still need stable backup for fluctuations - for days where there is little wind and little sun. We don't yet have practical energy storage technologies that would allow us to eliminate this problem.
…and the green movement don’t realise they’re being the useful idiots of the fossil fuel industries, who have been using this attack line for decades because they didn’t want the competition.
If you keep putting off building because it’s “too slow to build”, then guess what - it never gets built.
Would you care to try to reconcile “too expensive” with “you can’t put a price on the planet”?
And nice try with the democratic angle, but the truth more like we have a growing world population with a growing need for abundant, reliable, affordable energy. And yet we’re held hostage by the luxury beliefs of a tiny minority who feel they have a right to govern and want to bask in their perceived virtue.
I don't get why some people won't get that nuclear is not the solution to the energy problem. Nuclear is one of the most expensive energy sources, and that's without the cost of long term storage of burnt fuel. Without the cost of health issues in mining areas.
The call for energy consumption reduction is not "for cultish reasons", it's because of climate change that's already screwing us.
Deleted Comment
So you're left with water power (which is only applicable in few areas and they destroy the nature), coal/oil/gas (which are much worse for the environment) and nuclear energy.
Nuclear might not solve everything itself either, but it's definitely part of the solution.
I agree with you on the technical part. We would likely be in better shape if we advanced more in this area and built more power plants.
But to dismiss environmentalists like this is a bit simplistic.
Remember how long it took for climate change issues to establish in the mainstream?
Corporations and political groups have been fighting and suppressing these issues since the start.
We still don’t have serious discussions about this in large portions of society.
In a more ideal world, nuclear would have been continously integrated and improved to a larger degree. But that would have required for serious discussion in the first place.
AFAICT, modern day anti-nuclear movement is a bit different to that.
Lemmi rephrase this for you: If we ignored anti-nuclear activities funded by big-oil in the 70s this would not be a problem.
Yes! and if we ignored all the destructive FUD surrounding climate change they have been doing for more than 50 years we would be better off.
Furthermore, if we stop ignoring the destruction AI hype is doing to the climate we will be better off.
Main repo: https://github.com/dmf-archive/dmf-archive.github.io
IPWT theory: https://github.com/dmf-archive/IPWT
Since you didn't mention it, the latest Black Mirror also covers this (episode 1?). You might like it.
A mill next to a river "consumes" the water that turns its wheel, but then immediately releases it back into the river. That's very different to a cooling tower that turns that water into vapour and releases it into the air. Which is the data centre doing?
Assuming the data centre isn't actively depleting groundwater, the only important number is how much energy it consumes (including for water related activities). Perhaps also power per unit of compute.
In a lot of places in the world, using water for cooling is likely to be more efficient than an equivalent heat pump - so should be celebrated!
It is entirely possible to run a data center with a minimal fixed amount of water if the cost of power and real estate are not a concern.
So from the practical perspective of everybody else who happens to need water from the pipe/aquifer/lake/snowmelt, it's "gone" just as much as if it were dumped into the sea.
If they actually pump free water from source around their location and release it back how they want to, the points about water consumption are definitely legit.
"OpenAI has claimed that as of December 2025, ChatGPT has 300 million weekly active users generating 1 billion messages per day. "
**should be December of 2024 **, my brain bugged there.