> Quick googling found a stat that 1.6% of the whole world's electricity supply going on computing
That would imply that it isn't the major issue. Electricity generation as a whole is less than half of US energy consumption, US electricity generation is 35% nuclear or renewable, and computing is using 1.6% of electricity. This is a rounding error compared to e.g. transportation at 37% of all energy consumption, or HVAC at another double-digit percentage.
> And we need more!
New generation capacity in the US is disproportionately renewables because renewables will remain cheaper until they're closer to half of all generation and then have to really deal with the storage issues. Willingness to approve fossil fuel plants doesn't mean anybody really wants them. The large tech companies are buying nuclear:
We've been trying to build more clean nuclear plants for decades, but its been ironically the self-proclaimed environmentalists who have been blocking it every step of the way. We could have had 0 carbon electricity production nation wide since the 1980's.
Quick googling found a stat that 1.6% of the whole world's electricity supply going on computing and also https://www.visualcapitalist.com/charted-big-tech-uses-more-... etc.
And we need more! On day 2 of his presidency Trump pledged to fast-track new power generation to drive data centres in the US. https://www.axios.com/2025/01/23/trump-ai-power-plants-data-...
Drill baby drill! Using electricity on compute is driving future dirty power generation.