Need More Power.............

[rsterne]

From a research paper on AI power requirements....

"Because AI is energy-intensive. I put one example of this in my research article: I highlighted that if you were to fully turn Google’s search engine into something like ChatGPT, and everyone used it that way—so you would have nine billion chatbot interactions instead of nine billion regular searches per day—then the energy use of Google would spike. Google would need as much power as Ireland just to run its search engine."

Also....

"A continuation of the current trends in AI capacity and adoption are set to lead to NVIDIA shipping 1.5 million AI server units per year by 2027. These 1.5 million servers, running at full capacity, would consume at least 85.4 terawatt-hours of electricity annually—more than what many small countries use in a year".... "but global data centers, on average, will add 50 percent to the energy cost just to keep the machines cool." ....

A Terawatt is a million megawatts.... Only very large  power stations produce more than 1,000 megawats (1 gigawatt, or 0.001 terawatts)....

Bob

[airgunaut]

This subject was mentioned in a radio program I heard a few days ago. Come to think of it, the station might have been CBC.

[Madd Hatter]

There was a TV commercial that was running a few weeks ago that the AI companies are talking about needing to build their own power plants. I wonder what they're going to use to produce that power in those power plants? Solar, ok, what will they do after the sun sets? Wind? What about when the wind isn't blowing? 

[ER00z]

Imagine Doc nowadays...

[Privateer]

Wind? What about when the wind isn't blowing?

Harness Politicians for a lot of Wind.

[mobilehomer]

Reminds me of the EV discussion!!

[airgunaut]

Wind? What about when the wind isn't blowing?

Harness Politicians for a lot of Wind.

Perennially renewable source, too.

[Airspace]

The big 3 auto makers are now seeing the writing on the wall and either scaling back or shelving their EV research due to the inability of this nation to provide a reliable power grid for electric vehicles. So now their talking a power grid that makes ev chargers look like an aaa battery.

[airgunaut]

The big 3 auto makers are now seeing the writing on the wall and either scaling back or shelving their EV research due to the inability of this nation to provide a reliable power grid for electric vehicles. So now their talking a power grid that makes ev chargers look like an aaa battery.

Fools rush in where wise men fear to tread, or something like that.

[ER00z]

While on the topic of ever increasing power demands, what if another Carrington event were to happen?

[JPSAXNC]

Elon Musk said that we have already fed AI all of the available information that we have. So does that mean that AI can't tell us anything that we don't already know or suspect?

[Madd Hatter]

Elon Musk said that we have already fed AI all of the available information that we have. So does that mean that AI can't tell us anything that we don't already know or suspect?

As a collective yes. As an individual no.

[rsterne]

The answer as to how to provide the power is gas turbine generating plants with carbon sequestration.... Three US States plus Alberta have the natural gas, and the most efficient way is to build the AI data centers right near the power plants, and to build those near the gas fields.... We're talking gigawatt plus plants here, that can run 24/7.... They are the only type of plant that can be built fast enough to be online when they are needed, providing they start NOW.... Here is what a 1.25GW plant looks like....



Modern "combined-cycle" gas turbines use the heat from the exhaust gas to boil water to run a steam turbine to increase efficiency....

Bob

[splitbeing]

Folks are counting on the donut with fusion colored icing to fuel their unorecedented AI hauls, if memory serves.

"Headin cross country with this teratruckload of starving AI machines again, so I'll have an infinity fusion donut, a sausage egg and cheese on croissant, and a medium coffee one cream one sugar to go, please."

[rsterne]

Yeah, but I'm talking something in this century.... 

Bob

[splitbeing]

Did you see the news on DeepSeek AI, which requires less power?

Also, if  you are looking for fiction reading that's easy, the youndg adult series Scythe that became a best seller with adults I bet dollars to dimes is worth a shot. The AI character is unprecented and the series runs on moral quandaries like the one in your tagline.

[rsterne]

My opinion on DeepSeek is that if they prove that the AI training system works as claimed, that will help with the current, faster, more expensive and power hungry chips to get to AGI (Artificial General Intelligence) even faster than without it.... A comparison in our world would be a new valve that allows the same power with 50% less pressure (not possible as we know).... would soon lead to double the power with the original pressure....

Bob

[subscriber]

"Carbon" sequestration lets you burn fossil fuel without worrying about increasing CO2 levels.  The problem is that the O2 in CO2 is oxygen.  Locking away oxygen and taking it out of circulation permanently is a brilliant idea only to those who benefit financially from it. 

The "clean water and fresh air" crowd apparently don't mind the prospect of reduced oxygen levels.   They might protest that so little CO2 will actually be sequestered that there is no risk to breathable oxygen.  This contention supports the idea that the problem they are solving is not CO2 reduction, but how to justify moving lots of money from the public, into their own coffers.

This seems to be another case of, nothing is greener than freshly laundered public funds.

For the record, the reduction of CO2 is not "reducing pollution".  When catalytic converters came into use, they reduced the real pollution of CO, soot and partially burnt hydrocarbons into the harmless gas, CO2.  Certainly harmless at 0.04 percent concentrations.  Apparently, plants die if the CO2 levels drop below 0.02 percent, so we don't want carbon sequestration to be too effective, or too profitable.

Even if CO2 raised the average temperature by a whole 2 degrees, it would enable the of growing more food, especially in places that are cold, and have a short growing season, such as Canada.  This is a bad thing, only if human over-population is seen as a real problem.  Increasing the cost of energy is a solution, if the goal is population reduction.

As with most problems and their proposed solutions, follow the money.