Gizmodo: Generating AI Images Uses as Much Energy as Charging Your Phone, Study Finds. “Creating images with generative AI could use as much energy as charging your smartphone according to a new study Friday that measures the environmental impact of generative AI models for the first time. Popular models like ChatGPT’s Dall-E and Midjourney may produce more carbon than driving 4 miles.”
Politico: Europe’s grid is under a cyberattack deluge, industry warns. “Thousands of cyberattacks have inundated Europe’s energy grid since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and a top industry leader is calling for help as officials and researchers fret that not nearly enough is being done.”
Yale: Making Computing Sustainable, With Help from NSF Grant. “Working with Prof. Noa Zilberman from Oxford University, [Professor Robert] Soulé has received a grant jointly funded by the United Kingdom’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) and United States’ National Science Foundation (NSF) for work that aims to reduce the energy consumption of computing. Specifically, it sets its sights on computer networks, which consume an estimated one-and-a-half times the energy of all data centers, according to some reports.”
American Chemical Society: ’Indoor solar’ to power the Internet of Things. “From Wi-Fi-connected home security systems to smart toilets, the so-called Internet of Things brings personalization and convenience to devices that help run homes. But with that comes tangled electrical cords or batteries that need to be replaced. Now, researchers reporting in ACS Applied Energy Materials have brought solar panel technology indoors to power smart devices. They show which photovoltaic (PV) systems work best under cool white LEDs, a common type of indoor lighting.”
US Department of Energy: U.S. Department of Energy and U.S. Geological Survey Release Online Public Database of Large-Scale Solar Facilities. “The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) released the largest and most comprehensive database to date on large-scale solar energy projects in the United States. The U.S. Large-Scale Solar Photovoltaic Database (USPVDB) includes the location, size, and other characteristics of large-scale solar projects.”
EPA: EPA Launches Online Tool Providing Energy Use Data and Insights from ENERGY STAR® Portfolio Manager®. “Today, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is announcing the launch of a web-based tool that enables users to explore aggregate energy use data from more than 150,000 commercial and multi-family buildings in the United States.”
The Next Web: Google’s AI could soon consume as much electricity as Ireland, study finds. “A new study published this week suggests that the AI industry could consume as much energy as a country like Argentina, Netherlands, or Sweden by 2027. What’s more, the research estimates that if Google alone switched its whole search business to AI, it would end up using 29.3 terawatt-hours per year — equivalent to the electricity consumption of Ireland.”
Northwestern Now: AI just got 100-fold more energy efficient. “Northwestern University engineers have developed a new nanoelectronic device that can perform accurate machine-learning classification tasks in the most energy-efficient manner yet. Using 100-fold less energy than current technologies, the device can crunch large amounts of data and perform artificial intelligence (AI) tasks in real time without beaming data to the cloud for analysis.”
MIT News: New tools are available to help reduce the energy that AI models devour. “The MIT Lincoln Laboratory Supercomputing Center (LLSC) is developing techniques to help data centers reel in energy use. Their techniques range from simple but effective changes, like power-capping hardware, to adopting novel tools that can stop AI training early on. Crucially, they have found that these techniques have a minimal impact on model performance.”
CleanTechnica: Where Does Your Member Of Congress Stand On Offshore Drilling?. “NRDC’s new tool let’s you check out where your state’s delegation stands on new offshore oil and gas drilling. Some regions—like New England—have rejected drilling top to bottom. Other delegations—like those in Florida —have had a more mixed response. Some elected officials are calling on President Biden to end new offshore drilling across the board. Others object only to drilling along their state’s borders. Still others push for more of our ocean to be sold to Big Oil.”
WIRED: China-Linked Hackers Breached a Power Grid—Again. “Today, researchers on the Threat Hunter Team at Broadcom-owned security firm Symantec revealed that a Chinese hacker group with connections to APT41, which Symantec is calling RedFly, breached the computer network of a national power grid in an Asian country—though Symantec has declined to name which country was targeted. The breach began in February of this year and persisted for at least six months as the hackers expanded their foothold throughout the IT network of the country’s national electric utility, though it’s not clear how close the hackers came to gaining the ability to disrupt power generation or transmission.”
NREL: NREL Researchers Reveal How Buildings Across United States Do—and Could—Use Energy . “Buildings are responsible for 40% of total energy use in the United States, including 75% of all electricity use and 35% of the nation’s carbon emissions….To facilitate decarbonization of the U.S. building stock, researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) have created a new, meticulously researched data set that details how buildings do—and could—use energy. This data set, called the End-Use Load Profiles, reveals the massive climate impacts that improvements to the U.S. building stock could have.”
Washington State University: Machine learning innovation reduces computer power usage. “A framework that uses machine learning to make decisions about power usage can reduce energy use by up to 60% without affecting computing performance in multi-core processors used in large servers around the world.”
PV Magazine: Online mapping tool to identify policy-suitable land for renewables. “The tool is reportedly able to determine the number of rooftop or ground-mounted solar projects that can be deployed in a given area, as well as the maximum number of wind turbines within a site considering site geometry and the minimum distance required between each turbine. It can also identify buildings that can be connected to a district heating network within a specified distance.”
MIT News: Fast-tracking fusion energy’s arrival with AI and accessibility. “As part of their strategy to accelerate fusion energy’s arrival and reach carbon neutrality by 2050, the U.S. Department of Energy (DoE) has announced new funding for a project led by researchers at MIT’s Plasma Science and Fusion Center (PSFC) and four collaborating institutions.”
