Electricity prices rise, and AI is blame

Your electricity bill is likely to have risen over the past year. This is because you effectively pay artificial intelligence tax. According to Axios reportThe cost of electricity climbs all over the country, driven primarily with the increasing energy requirements for the huge data centers that are built to train and operate artificial intelligence models.

US Energy Information Administration data showed that the cost of 1 kWh of electricity increased from 16.41 cents to 17.47 cents over the past year, an increase of 6.5 %. But at the state level separately, the population sees their electrical bills rising. Min saw that the electricity prices jump 36.3 %, the Conettecity increased by 18.4 %, and Utah witnessed a bump of 15.2 %.

This is at least partially due to data centers that are standing as quickly as possible by technology companies that all work on artificial intelligence. A recent report issued by Think Tank Rand has estimated that global energy demand from artificial intelligence data centers may reach 327 GW by 2030 – 30 % of the United States. The current network capacity of 1,280 GB.

The requirements of the current data center projects are already proposed on the network and its operators. In the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, which has become known as “Data center“Because of the huge number of facilities that work there, it is expected that the prices will rise after a modern auction designed to ensure the existence of enough energy generation to meet the demands He witnessed high prices. About 60 % of this increase in prices are attributed to data centers by One reportWhich found that $ 9.3 billion will be eventually transferred to customers – most of them are population.

It is not just the same energy cost that causes high prices. It is the cost of building the network so quickly. According to axiosThe cost of that construction is transferred to consumers, and there is currently a lot of demand for network operators for construction faster. For each Lawrence Berkeley National LaboratoryNetwork calls at the end of 2023 were already more than twice the current power capacity of the American network.

It seems that it is strange, at least, the richest companies on this planet and startups that are estimated at billions of dollars, expect the residents to restrict the bill for their aspirations. Google, at least recently, An agreement signed To reduce the use of energy from databases during peak hours, but also Plan to pour 25 billion dollars In data center projects. Companies like meta are also advancing Huge data centers For their artificial intelligence initiatives. Meanwhile, it seems that we are all stuck in supporting their power bills because they carry a pistol on his head The broader economy.