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@kentpitman@climatejustice.social

Post #3209126

2026-06-03 05:37 UTC

@screwlisp@gamerplus.org @yantar92@fosstodon.org I'm not sure I entirely get your point. I must be missing something. All I'm saying is that until the things that pre-existed data centers have been greened, the fact that your greening some data centers is not what It seems. I don't really care what the status of solar versus fossil is in an isolated situation, only globally as a whole. Even for as much solar as there is it's having trouble keeping pace with the rate of increase in total use. I've heard there are places where it's gotten ahead but I'm not sure even globally whether it has or whether it has by very much. I don't know if you have progressive taxation where you are, but here in the US for our federal tax, the first few dollars are taxed at one rate and then greater dollars are taxed at another rate. In essence, the first few dollars are acknowledged to be things that you need to live on and so not as much is asked of those dollars. If you make extra money, we speak in terms of the marginal rate, which is the highest because you're adding it on top of the other ones. And it creates an ordering where all money is not the same. There is necessity money and there is luxury money. Similarly for energy, there is necessity energy and there is luxury energy and I am putting data centers squarely in the luxury camp. Their impact on the world's resources occurs at the margins, at the upper edge. Until necessity energy is all green, the original task that climate change asks of us, I personally refuse to recognize even the concept of luxury green. When necessity is green, then we may add luxuries at whatever rate we can keep them green. https://netsettlement.blogspot.com/2024/10/green-ai.html

Replies (1)

  • @screwlisp@gamerplus.org 2026-06-03 05:56

    @kentpitman@climatejustice.social I wonder if someone has done an analysis of the cost of e.g. having a person orgmode lob-ingest and o-b-execute a few internal orgmode documents to e.g. generate a fancy report, which would be a no-datacentres-at-all thing to do, versus having an ai invent the report from first principles in a datacentre on the other side of the world. @yantar92@fosstodon.org

    Open ##3209127