'Let's Not Go Overboard' On Worries About AI Energy Use, Bill Gates Says (ft.com) 46
An anonymous reader shares a report: Bill Gates has defended the rapid rise in energy use caused by AI systems, arguing the technology would ultimately offset its heavy consumption of electricity. Speaking in London, Gates urged environmentalists and governments to "not go overboard" on concerns about the huge amounts of power required to run new generative AI systems, as Big Tech companies such as Microsoft race to invest tens of billions of dollars in vast new data centres.
Data centres will drive a rise in global electricity usage of between 2-6 per cent, the billionaire said. "The question is, will AI accelerate a more than 6 per cent reduction? And the answer is: certainly," said Gates, the Microsoft co-founder who has been a prolific investor in companies developing sustainable energy and carbon- reduction technologies. In May, Microsoft admitted that its greenhouse gas emissions had risen by almost a third since 2020, in large part due to the construction of data centres.
Gates, who left Microsoft's board in 2020 but remains an adviser to chief executive Satya Nadella, said tech companies would pay a "green premium" -- or higher price -- for clean energy as they seek new sources of power, which was helping to drive its development and deployment. "The tech companies are the people willing to pay a premium and to help bootstrap green energy capacity," he said at the Breakthrough Energy Summit in London on Thursday.
Data centres will drive a rise in global electricity usage of between 2-6 per cent, the billionaire said. "The question is, will AI accelerate a more than 6 per cent reduction? And the answer is: certainly," said Gates, the Microsoft co-founder who has been a prolific investor in companies developing sustainable energy and carbon- reduction technologies. In May, Microsoft admitted that its greenhouse gas emissions had risen by almost a third since 2020, in large part due to the construction of data centres.
Gates, who left Microsoft's board in 2020 but remains an adviser to chief executive Satya Nadella, said tech companies would pay a "green premium" -- or higher price -- for clean energy as they seek new sources of power, which was helping to drive its development and deployment. "The tech companies are the people willing to pay a premium and to help bootstrap green energy capacity," he said at the Breakthrough Energy Summit in London on Thursday.
"Easy, simply deconserve energy real quick." (Score:4, Interesting)
"Data centres will drive a rise in global electricity usage of between 2-6 per cent, the billionaire said. 'The question is, will AI accelerate a more than 6 per cent reduction? And the answer is: certainly,' said Gates"
Uh, okay. How?
Maybe the answer is in the paywalled article? But I kind of doubt it.
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Possibly because if you eliminate enough human jobs, you eliminate the carbon emissions entailed with that work. Which may be why he was not anxious to talk about specifics.
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Electricity production
Transmission
or
Usage ?
We will all use a lot less energy (Score:2)
40 years of not caring negates 4 year of PR (Score:2)
Large software companies haven't done systemic power consumption reduction of their products, bloated web sites, bloated JavaScript in an EXE file, for 40+ years.
They've shifted the electricity cost from the mainframe to the consumer and now to the consumer + cloud.
How many billions of kilowatt hours have been used and paid for by end users (not the software company) because of power hungry software?
Where's the call to produce lighter software, not push out 2 cosmetic reskin releases a year (just to pretend
"Whoa, there!" (Score:4, Informative)
"Hold on, now! Let us tech billionaires continue to socialize our costs," said Bill.
And everyone listened because it was a pleasant change from that "debate" last night.
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I mean, the upside is that these datacenters (mostly) aren't exporting and hiding their costs. (Electricity generation's externalities are not the worst, but are often relevant) Companies trying to do the power-hungry AI training or running expensive models have to pay for that electricity themselves (and this provides direct incentive to try and find more efficient ways of training/etc). They might pass that cost on to the consumer, but that's in fairly obvious ways. Contrast all the cryptocurrency nonsens
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"Hold on, now! Let us tech billionaires continue to socialize our costs," said Bill.
And everyone listened because it was a pleasant change from that "debate" last night.
FTFS - "The tech companies are the people willing to pay a premium and to help bootstrap green energy capacity"
Sure thing, Epstein's Pal (Score:1, Offtopic)
I don't care what Bill Gates says. Climate Change seems to be only important when it doesn't impact his revenue streams. This guy can go pound rocks in one of his farms that he's going to find a way to exploit like his own female employees.
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why stop at whales, lets "kill all humans" because Ai can bend more girders
Listen to the Master Thief (Score:5, Insightful)
Bill ALWAYS has an angle.
What's he trying to steal this time?
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He's getting the noisy crowd up in arms about how much electricity AI is burning.
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He still owns something like 1.4% of all Microsoft stock. That sounds like sufficient motivation.
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He's trying to profit from AI on one side, and nuclear power for AI on the other. As he has a vested interest in both sides of the transaction, we have an obligation to ourselves to be critical of his opinion.
I have no idea what this processing power is... (Score:2)
Maybe they're trying using all this processing power for black budget govt stuff. Maybe they're just creating fake demand to manipulate energy markets. Either way, the idea that AI is a productive use of resources just
Re:I have no idea what this processing power is... (Score:4, Interesting)
You have no idea what's using all the power, but you're guessing black ops, market manipulation.. or aliens?
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Can you make that make sense?
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i mean you are on slashdot, if your GF/waifu needs more compute then she deserves more compute
It's the same as Bitcoin (Score:3)
We already know Bitcoin alone was able to suck down more power than Argentina. Like the entire country. Cryptocurrency is small potatoes compared to what AI, in other words LLMs, is capable of. Cryptocurrency is mostly useful for money laundering AI replaces employee
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AI doesn't actually represent any new kind of anything. LLMs aren't new and they don't need dedicated nuclear reactors. Image recognition isn't new and it doesn't require dedicated nuclear reactors. Voice synthesizers aren't new and they don't require dedicated nuclear reactors. I've seen a holographic tupac and Gene Kelly dance with a vacuum. None of it required dedicated nuclear reacto
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The products are chatbots and clip art generators
Those being big public-facing uses =/= they are the only, or even the "greatest" / "biggest" use cases though.
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This comment will backfire. (Score:2)
Put your money where your mouth is. (Score:2)
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You do know that Gates is known for his support of nuclear fission for low carbon energy, don't you? He's explained in interviews why he's looking to nuclear power than renewable energy. I could not find the interview I had in mind in a quick search but this interview touches on the issue:
https://www.npr.org/2024/06/14... [npr.org]
A summary of his argument for nuclear fission, as I understand it, is that there's a lot of places on Earth, such as Japan and Korea, that lack the geography to get enough energy from ren
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You do know that Gates is known for his support of nuclear fission for low carbon energy, don't you?
You do know that Gates is mostly known for his lack of support from Slashdotters, don't you? Invoking his name here, of all places, to support your views is what I might call "anti-propaganda". It makes you look rather like a shill.
The reduction in energy use has already started (Score:2)
https://arstechnica.com/inform... [arstechnica.com]
Yeah that's easy for him to say (Score:2)
There is MONEY to be made! (Score:2)
Let's not stand in the way of that, even if it kills us.
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He probably figures he'll be dead before the worst of it happens anyway.
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Yep. Well. Gates always was a PoS and still is. Even if he likes to pretend otherwise.
Double Dipping (Score:2)
As he is also an investor in Terrapower [terrapower.com].
Seeing as AI is primarily being marketed (Score:2)
The good news is the supreme Court just ruled that you can be criminally charged for homelessness even when there
"Don't worry about energy use!" (Score:1)
Meanwhile they're trying to destroy the energy market for anything but EV.
Never mind that various grids simply CANNOT KEEP UP WITH DEMAND!
Orly? (Score:2)
In an alternate universe... (Score:2)
"The tech companies are the people willing to pay a premium and to help bootstrap green energy capacity," he said at the Breakthrough Energy Summit in London on Thursday.
Yes. I'm sure every tech company is thrilled to pay more for energy. Because their investors/shareholders are ALWAYS happy when costs increase and their profits diminish.
Bill, you lost touch completely with reality.
Thousands per year already dead of climate change. (Score:2)
Bill Gates. HA! (Score:1)
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$6.40 ought to be enough for you
Classic problem solving in the tech industry (Score:2)
Don't worry about AI power consumption. Once we figure out how to get it working right, we'll ask the AI to fix the problem for us.
Bill happens to do something with energy (Score:2)
What a coincidence!
Bill gets a piece of the pie with his unicorn nuclear reactors.