zlacker

[return to "Sam Altman Says AI Using Too Much Energy Will Require Breakthrough Energy Source"]
1. boulos+nm[view] [source] 2024-01-22 23:37:13
>>Dyslex+(OP)
It's unfortunate that no math is ever done in these stories.

If you take the "350,000" H100s that Facebook wants by EOY, each of those can do 700W, which gives you almost 250 MW for just the GPUs. That sounds like a lot, until you realize that a single large power plant is measured in Gigawatts. All of Google's data centers combined are O(10 GW) which are matched with renewable power offsets [1].

Importantly, the world installed >500 Gigawatts of renewable energy in 2023 [2], mostly driven by PV Solar in China. The amount of potential solar and wind and other renewable-ish (hydro) outstrips even a 10x'ing of a lot of these numbers. But even for a single site, dams like Three Gorges are >20 GW.

There are real efficiency and scale challenges in doing AI in a single, large site. But existing power generation systems deliver plenty of power.

[1] https://www.gstatic.com/gumdrop/sustainability/google-2023-e...

[2] https://www.iea.org/reports/renewables-2023/executive-summar...

◧◩
2. nategl+cp[view] [source] 2024-01-22 23:55:11
>>boulos+nm
Energy production capacity in the US is relatively flat for the last couple of decades. The renewable installation is offsetting the decommission of coal. The capacity installed in China is not really accessible to Open AI due to recent security competition (both export restrictions on AI and a desire to import less energy). The capital costs of power are also quite high so I think he is pretty accurate considering the expectations of a startup to hockey stick.
◧◩◪
3. boulos+zr[view] [source] 2024-01-23 00:08:47
>>nategl+cp
https://www.publicpower.org/system/files/documents/Americas_... via https://www.publicpower.org/resource/americas-electricity-ge... disagrees with you even in the last decade. And the future seems mostly solar:

> This report also analyzes prospective generation capacity in four categories — under construction, permitted, application pending, and proposed. More than 466,000 MW of new generation capacity is under development in the United States — a 13% increase over 2022. Sixty-one percent of capacity most likely to come online, permitted plants and plants that are under construction, are in solar.

China's growth in power capacity is non-trivially due to increasing demand. If the US or Europe or wherever suddenly wanted to build XXX GW per year, they could (modulo bureaucracy, which is very real).

[go to top]