A
This natural resource is used to cool AI data centers.
Water
Cooling prevents these machines from overheating.
Servers or data centers
Training this type of advanced technology can use millions of liters of water.
Artificial Intelligence (AI)
AI companies build these to power and cool their models.
Data centers and servers
Water usage by AI impacts this natural system.
Environment or water cycle
Cooling systems often rely on this method, which evaporates water to remove heat.
Evaporative cooling
This sustainable practice reuses water in cooling systems.
Water recycling
This large AI model developed by OpenAI required lots of energy and water.
ChatGPT
High water use in AI can lead to shortages where
Everywhere
If a server gets too hot and water cooling fails, it may do this.
Shut down or crash
Using too much water in dry areas can contribute to this environmental problem.
This measurement tells us how much water is used for a specific task.
Water footprint
In addition to water, data centers use a lot of this resource.
Electricity
This type of AI use (common in apps like ChatGPT) still consumes water even after training.
Inference or running AI
A data center that uses solar panels and water recycling is called this.
Sustainable data center or Green data center
Name one alternative to water-based cooling.
Air, immersion or geothermal cooling
This tech giant paused data center plans due to water concerns in the Netherlands.
Microsoft
AI water use is mostly invisible to users and is called this kind of cost.
Hidden or indirect cost
Training bigger models increases water use for this reason.
More to compute = more heat = more cooling
Countries facing water stress may oppose this type of AI expansion.
AI infustrcture
This role in tech companies is responsible for tracking environmental impact.
Sustainability officer or environmental engineer
AI companies might be asked to publicly share this kind of water usage data.
Water footprint reports
Give one solution to reduce AIs water footprint without stopping innovation.
Renewable energy, building in cooler climates, optimizing models, as people we can change the way we prompt
This term refers to making sure AI helps people without harming the planet.
Ethical or responsible AI