Data centers will use 2030 twice as driven by AI
Data centers had about 1.5 percent of the global electricity consumption in 2024, expected to duplicate in 2030 due to the use of AI
A photo made on December 23, 2023 shows the base of Tencent’s large data centers and cloud computing in the east of China, Jiangning development in the field of development, Jiangsu province, China.
Costfoto / Nurphoto via Getty Images
Electricity consumption of data centers 2030. More than double-year is projected, according to A inform By the International Energy Agency currently published. The main guilty? Artificial intelligence (AI).
The report covers the current energy imprints for data centers and predicts future needs, which plans for government, business and local community infrastructure AI spread.
The IEA models will use data centers in 2045 in Terawatt-hour (Twh) in 2030, the Japanese annual electricity consumption will be equivalent. Comparative, data centers consumed 415 times in 2024, approximately 1.5% of world electricity consumption (see ‘Global Electricity Growth’).
To help Science Journalism
If you enjoy this article, consider entering award-winning journalism Subscribe. By purchasing subscription, you are helping to ensure the future of stories about the discoveries and ideas that are conformed to today.
Projections are largely based on data centers, including AI computational tasks. Although the agency calculated the server proportion at the Data Centers offered to AI. The AI server found 24% of the server electricity demand and 15% of the date center in 2024.
Alex de Vries, a researcher of Vu Amsterdam and the founder of the digiconomist was not involved, is believed to be underestimated. The report “is a bit blurred when it comes to AI,” he noted.
Even with these uncertainty, “we must keep in mind about how much energy consumed all these data centers,” says Vries. “Whatever the exact number, we are talking several percentage of the global electricity consumption.”
More power is needed
IEA reports 85% of the current energy consumption of data centers, Europe and China will be planned by the development of the economy by 20%, and advanced economies will have more than 20% (see ‘data center energy growth’).
The countries are building electric power plants and electricity grids are renewed to meet the energy demand for data centers. But IEA estimated 20% of the planned centers for being linked online delays.
The authors write the projections that come with uncertainty, in part, there is no light to which they will use AI applications in the future. Data centers also collect and denounce the use of their energy Limited way.
Date center of electricity use “The risk” can be a serious risk to have the ability to achieve our climate goals, “says Vries. Although two-thirds of planned electricity capacity come from renewable sources, IEs will also promote the dissemination of new gas station plants in the natural petrol station. “We will go to increase our confidence, or at least stretch our trust for fossil fuels,” he added vries.
Electricity consumption and projected growth are not uniforms around the world. Companies tend to build data centers in concentrated clusters, which describes IEA reports, which can be filtered by local networks.
This article reproduces with permission and has been First posted On April 10, 2025.
