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Next time you turn to ChatGPT, try asking it how much energy it takes to answer your query. The International Energy Agency estimates the answer is 2.9 watt hours (Wh), or 10 times more than a Google search.
The excitement around AI helps explain why demand for data center electricity is expected to take off. This additional burden is an obstacle to the energy transition. But, as Microsoft’s agreement to support perhaps $10 billion in new Brookfield renewable projects As it suggests, image-conscious tech giants are well positioned to help.
The challenge is clear. Data center demand to roughly double by 2026, from 460 TWh to 1,000 TWh says the IEA. Worse yet, data processing facilities tend to converge on favorable locations. In tax-friendly Ireland, for example, they will account for more than 30 percent of total electricity consumption in 2026.
Achieving that is a big task, especially when utilities and networks are already stretched to the limit. In fact, Ireland will only allow new data centers to connect to the network if they have the capacity to switch to your own supply.
The risk is that the data center boom could spur construction of new gas-fired power plants. Dominion Energy, active in Virginia, where there are many data centers, has flagged 9 GW of potential new gas-fired capacity. to help with reliability. Microsoft is building a gas-fired power station in Dublin to provide backup power.
The advantage, however, is that the tech giants are rich, innovative, and eager to curry favor with the general public. They are already large buyers of renewable energy and sign long-term power purchase agreements that allow developers to build new capacity. Microsoft’s deal with Brookfield (eight times the size of the previous largest corporate purchase) is one example.
Adding green electricity to the grid is easy. Data centers need electricity all the time, while renewables are volatile. Equalizing consumption everywhere and at all times (as Google and Microsoft have promised to do by 2030) means getting creative.
In addition to batteries, they will have to think about solutions for the occasional days without sun, without wind or with grid outages, creating a market for long-duration storage.
The ideal solution, of course, would be a technology that provides clean, reliable electricity. Nuclear energy has not had it easy in many parts of the world. But Microsoft, for example, now has a nuclear technology director working on small modular reactors for its data centers.
With the backing of the technological world, the renaissance of nuclear energy seems much more likely.