Artificial intelligence (AI) is rapidly becoming the largest energy hog within worldwide digital infrastructure.

In my latest research, published in the academic journal Joule today, I show that AI systems were responsible for up to 20% of global data center power demand by the end of last year. Moreover, this share could approach half of data center power demand by the end of this year, as the power demand of AI systems could rise to 23 gigawatts. This exceeds the current power demand of cryptocurrency mining and is equivalent to twice the power needed to keep my home country the Netherlands running.

Big tech companies are well aware of this trend, as companies such as Google even mention having faced a “power capacity crisis” in their efforts to expand data center capacity. At the same time, these companies prefer not to talk about the numbers involved. Google was the only big tech company revealing that AI represented 10%–15% of their total energy use over the years 2019 – 2021, but since ChatGPT kicked-off the AI-hype we’ve never seen anything like this again. As a result, it remains virtually impossible to gain a good insight into the actual energy consumption of AI.

By diving into semiconductor manufacturing (concentrated in East Asia), a bunch of (Chinese) analyst reports and earnings call transcripts I found a way to shed some light on where the power demand of AI is heading – and it turns out this growing at lightning speed. This growth clashes with other social ambitions, such as achieving climate goals and reducing total energy consumption. However, effective policy responses will first require urgent transparency from an otherwise opaque industry.

The full article can be accessed for free during the next 50 days through the following link: https://authors.elsevier.com/a/1l8Ke925JEVNpG

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.joule.2025.101961

Source and More information: AI power demand rapidly escalating

Author: Digiconomist.net