{"id":205268,"date":"2026-02-23T08:18:52","date_gmt":"2026-02-23T08:18:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/teknomers.com\/en\/ai-consumes-huge-amounts-of-energy-sam-altman-compares-it-to-the-cost-of-training-humans\/"},"modified":"2026-02-23T08:18:53","modified_gmt":"2026-02-23T08:18:53","slug":"ai-consumes-huge-amounts-of-energy-sam-altman-compares-it-to-the-cost-of-training-humans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/teknomers.com\/en\/ai-consumes-huge-amounts-of-energy-sam-altman-compares-it-to-the-cost-of-training-humans\/","title":{"rendered":"AI Consumes Huge Amounts of Energy: Sam Altman Compares It to the Cost of \u201cTraining\u201d Humans"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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OpenAI CEO Sam Altman participated in a recent event organized by The Indian Express. During this insightful interview, he addressed pressing concerns about the energy consumption associated with training AI models like ChatGPT. Notably, he argued that many discussions surrounding this topic are disproportionately unfair.<\/p>\n

Training Humans Also Consumes a Lot<\/h2>\n

When asked about ChatGPT’s energy consumption, Altman took a moment before making a thought-provoking comparison. He emphasized the energy expenditures required not just for AI, but for human training as well. \u201cOne of the things that is always unfair in this comparison is that it talks about how much energy it takes to train an AI model compared to what it costs a human to perform an inference query,\u201d he stated.<\/p>\n

But it also takes a lot of energy to train a human.<\/strong> It takes about 20 years of life and all the food you eat during that time before you become intelligent. Not only that, it took the widespread evolution of the hundred billion people who have lived and learned to understand science and more to create you.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Altman suggested that a fair comparison would involve looking at the energy needed for ChatGPT to respond to a query after its model is trained, which he believes has already become energy-efficient.<\/p>\n

Training vs. Inference Costs<\/h2>\n

Altman\u2019s comparison raises an important distinction: training and inference costs. Learning, whether in humans or AI, requires significant resources, but the subsequent application of that knowledge\u2014known as inference\u2014has far lower energy demands. While acknowledging that AI does consume substantial energy during training, Altman argued that once trained, models like ChatGPT become highly efficient in their inference phase.<\/p>\n

Although he has claimed that the energy consumption during inference is minimal, he has not yet provided definitive evidence to substantiate this claim.<\/p>\n

The Water Consumption Controversy<\/h2>\n

Altman also touched upon the contentious issue of water consumption in large AI data centers. He noted that although water usage was problematic in the past\u2014particularly with evaporative cooling methods\u2014current practices have evolved significantly. \u201cWe don\u2019t do that anymore,\u201d he asserted, declaring accusations that \u201cChatGPT uses 17 gallons per query\u201d as \u201ctotally false\u201d and \u201ccrazy.\u201d Still, a lack of official data from AI companies complicates the issue.<\/p>\n

What is the True Consumption of AI?<\/h2>\n

Despite ongoing debates, concrete data on AI\u2019s energy and water consumption is still elusive. Some studies have exaggerated figures, and in the U.S., there is no legislation mandating transparency in this area, leaving the discourse largely speculative.<\/p>\n

Increasing Efficiency in Models and Data Centers<\/h2>\n

One promising study from Epoch AI in February 2025 suggested that AI\u2019s actual energy consumption is significantly less than often claimed. The findings implied that AI models have become more efficient over time, supported by advancements in chips and cooling systems. While the energy demands of data centers are substantial, advances in technology suggest a trend toward reduced consumption.<\/p>\n

The dialogue on energy use in AI continues to evolve, warranting more nuanced evaluations as both technology and societal expectations progress.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n


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General News – 2<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman participated in a recent event organized by The Indian Express. During this insightful interview, he addressed pressing concerns about the energy consumption associated with training AI models like ChatGPT. Notably, he argued that many discussions surrounding this topic are disproportionately unfair. Training Humans Also Consumes a Lot When asked about ChatGPT’s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":205269,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36399],"tags":[18791,3820,12726,19732,2180,57,1738,5888,18790,324],"class_list":["post-205268","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-technology","tag-altman","tag-amounts","tag-compares","tag-consumes","tag-cost","tag-energy","tag-huge","tag-humans","tag-sam","tag-training"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/teknomers.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/205268","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/teknomers.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/teknomers.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teknomers.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teknomers.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=205268"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/teknomers.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/205268\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":205270,"href":"https:\/\/teknomers.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/205268\/revisions\/205270"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teknomers.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/205269"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/teknomers.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=205268"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teknomers.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=205268"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teknomers.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=205268"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}