{"id":7643,"date":"2026-06-28T21:05:41","date_gmt":"2026-06-28T21:05:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/greenfilmshooting.net\/blog\/en\/?p=7643"},"modified":"2026-07-05T21:19:38","modified_gmt":"2026-07-05T21:19:38","slug":"environmental-cost-of-artificial-intelligence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/greenfilmshooting.net\/blog\/en\/2026\/06\/28\/environmental-cost-of-artificial-intelligence\/","title":{"rendered":"Environmental Cost of Artificial Intelligence"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"twoclick_social_bookmarks_post_7643 social_share_privacy clearfix 1.6.4 locale-en_US sprite-en_US\"><\/div><div class=\"twoclick-js\"><script type=\"text\/javascript\">\/* <![CDATA[ *\/\njQuery(document).ready(function($){if($('.twoclick_social_bookmarks_post_7643')){$('.twoclick_social_bookmarks_post_7643').socialSharePrivacy({\"txt_help\":\"Wenn Sie diese Felder durch einen Klick aktivieren, werden Informationen an Facebook, Twitter, Flattr, Xing, t3n, LinkedIn, Pinterest oder Google eventuell ins Ausland \\u00fcbertragen und unter Umst\\u00e4nden auch dort gespeichert. N\\u00e4heres erfahren Sie durch einen Klick auf das <em>i<\\\/em>.\",\"settings_perma\":\"Dauerhaft aktivieren und Daten\\u00fcber-tragung zustimmen:\",\"info_link\":\"http:\\\/\\\/www.heise.de\\\/ct\\\/artikel\\\/2-Klicks-fuer-mehr-Datenschutz-1333879.html\",\"uri\":\"https:\\\/\\\/greenfilmshooting.net\\\/blog\\\/en\\\/2026\\\/06\\\/28\\\/environmental-cost-of-artificial-intelligence\\\/\",\"post_id\":7643,\"post_title_referrer_track\":\"Environmental+Cost+of+Artificial+Intelligence\",\"display_infobox\":\"on\"});}});\n\/* ]]> *\/<\/script><\/div><p>The rapid expansion of artificial intelligence requires a physical infrastructure of data centers, advanced chips, cooling systems, electricity grids, water resources, land, and critical mineral supply chains. In 2025, global data centres consumed an estimated 448 terawatt-hours of electricity. Researchers are warning about the greenhouse gas emissions of data centers. But the environmental costs of AI and data centers cannot be understood through carbon emissions alone, as UN scientists expose in the report <a href=\"https:\/\/unu.edu\/inweh\/collection\/environmental-cost-of-AIs-Enrgy-Use-Carbon-water-and-land-footprints\">Environmental Cost of AI&#8217;s Energy Use: Carbon, Water and Land Footprints<\/a> by the United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health (UNU-INWEH).<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The report finds that AI&#8217;s environmental cost is being systematically mismeasured. Most existing assessments focus on the carbon emissions associated with training large models. Yet every kilowatt-hour of electricity used to train or run an AI system also carries a water footprint, from cooling and power generation, and a land footprint, from energy infrastructure and supply chains. These three footprints do not move in the same direction. Switching from coal to bioenergy, for example, can on average cut the carbon footprint of electricity by seventy per cent, while increasing its water footprint more than thirty-fold and its land footprint a hundred-fold. According to the UN scientist &quot;low-carbon&quot; is not automatically &quot;low-water&quot; or &quot;low-land\u201d. They point out that evaluating AI sustainability through a single metric can hide trade-offs and shift environmental burdens onto regions already facing water or land stress.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis report is not a case against artificial intelligence, a technological transformation that is improving the lives of billions of people around the world,&quot; underlines Professor Kaveh Madani, Director of UNU-INWEH who led the investigation team. &quot;It is a call for using it responsibly and addressing its unintended impacts proactively to make it sustainable and equitable. We have a narrow window to ensure that the backbone of the technological revolution of our era develops within planetary limits, and that the communities who provide the critical minerals for advancing AI and the ones that host its infrastructure and e-waste are also among those who benefit from it.&quot;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>United Nations Secretary-General Ant\u00f3nio Guterres announced the launch of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.un.org\/sg\/en\/content\/sg\/statements\/2026-06-23\/secretary-generals-special-address-london-climate-action-week-delivered\">AI Environmental Transparency Initiative<\/a>, which is calling on major artificial intelligence companies in the private sector to publicly disclose the full environmental impacts of their systems. Guterres suggests that AI companies should also commit to powering their facilities with electricity produced with renewable technologies, such as wind and solar, by 2030. &quot;As climate change, conflict and artificial intelligence reshape the world, our future depends on institutions that are innovative and ready to adapt.&quot;, said Guterres.\u00a0 &quot;This means ensuring digital technologies are deployed ethically and effectively \u2013 both to reach more people in need, and to enable greater community participation in decision-making.&quot;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><em>Photo: \u00a9 BalticServers.com, CC BY-SA 3.0, via <a href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-sa\/3.0\">Wikimedia Commons<\/a><\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The rapid expansion of artificial intelligence requires a physical infrastructure of data centers, advanced chips, cooling systems, electricity grids, water resources, land, and critical mineral supply chains. In 2025, global data centres consumed an estimated 448 terawatt-hours of electricity. Researchers are warning about the greenhouse gas emissions of data centers. But the environmental costs of \u2026 <a class=\"moretag\" href=\"https:\/\/greenfilmshooting.net\/blog\/en\/2026\/06\/28\/environmental-cost-of-artificial-intelligence\/\">Read more<\/a>","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":7647,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,38,8,41,27,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7643","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-co-calculation","category-energy-efficiency","category-organization","category-renewables","category-science","category-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/greenfilmshooting.net\/blog\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7643","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/greenfilmshooting.net\/blog\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/greenfilmshooting.net\/blog\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greenfilmshooting.net\/blog\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greenfilmshooting.net\/blog\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7643"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/greenfilmshooting.net\/blog\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7643\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7649,"href":"https:\/\/greenfilmshooting.net\/blog\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7643\/revisions\/7649"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greenfilmshooting.net\/blog\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7647"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/greenfilmshooting.net\/blog\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7643"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greenfilmshooting.net\/blog\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7643"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greenfilmshooting.net\/blog\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7643"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}