The week at IO+: Energy-hungry artificial intelligence
Every Sunday, our weekly review offers an overview of the most interesting stories around important innovations.
Published on April 27, 2025
Bart, co-founder of Media52 and Professor of Journalism oversees IO+, events, and Laio. A journalist at heart, he keeps writing as many stories as possible.
Slowly but surely, the uncomfortable reality is beginning to dawn on more and more people: engaging with AI is a questionable activity for more than one reason. After all, we have all wondered at some point what happens to the data we feed into ChatGPT, Claude, Mistral, and all the other tools we use every day. The ease with which we accept the outputs of these machines as accurate (or even use them to deliberately create falsehoods) is also a much-discussed problem.
However, a relatively new concern is the excessive energy consumption associated with all the conversations we have with AI machines. According to the new 'special report' by the International Energy Agency (IEA), Energy and AI, global electricity demand from data centers will more than double by 2030 to around 945 terawatt hours (TWh), more than Japan's total electricity consumption today.
That is precisely why IO+ is co-organizing a big event on November 26: “Watt Matters in AI.” During this conference, we will examine various aspects of the playing field, including how to design hardware and software that is less energy-intensive, as well as how to adapt our own behavior. To put it bluntly, not every image we ask AI to design is equally useful to humanity.
However, the picture is not entirely negative, thanks to the same IEA study. Although AI consumes a significant amount of energy, it also offers robust solutions to enhance the efficiency, reliability, and sustainability of the energy system. AI applications are utilized in the oil and gas, electricity, industrial, transportation, and building sectors to optimize activities, reduce emissions, and lower costs. In electricity grids, AI can help predict renewable energy production, detect faults, and optimize electricity flow, thereby limiting outages and unlocking previously unused capacity.
In short, the picture is nuanced. Anyone interested in our conference day can register now. Click on the banner below for more information and the registration link.
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And then there was this:
- State Secretary for Defense calls AI the backbone of all innovation
- Our dilemma with EVs: how do we reconcile ambition and reality?
- Innovation Maestros: Founder Ziemi has been inventing since she was nine
- It was World IP Day - 10 insights from the world of patents
- The Netherlands is well on its way to its own AI factory
- Director of RAI Automotive: 'Time to test autonomous driving'
- CuRe Technology finds a solution for difficult-to-recycle plastic
- How digital twins help improve decision-making in construction
- LionVolt innovates anodes, accelerating the energy transition
- Stock options are more accessible for startup employees
- Green Chemistry pushes for a national plastics standard
- Control over nitrogen emissions thanks to photonic chips
- DAF CEO: 'Decarbonization is a team sport, not a solo race'
Want to make sure you don't miss a thing? You can find an overview of all our articles here. Have a great Sunday!