The Week in Green Software: Generative AI and Cloud Zombies
04/12/23 • 26 min
Chris Adams is joined by cloud sustainability advocate and founder of Cloud Sustainably, Aerin Booth in this episode of TWiGS brought to you by the Green Software Foundation. On this episode Aerin provides his insight into the cloud to discuss cloud zombies, the effect that generative AI is having on the environment and exciting developments from Xbox (including a list of some of Aerin’s favourite nostalgic games!). We also touch on GreenOps and the future for green software developers.
Learn more about our people:
Find out more about the GSF:
News:
Aerin Booth: When I think about anything we choose to do, not only in terms of carbon and IT, but in our life, if it doesn't have purpose, it's almost a waste. And we forget that we're not really building things for ourselves in technology. We're trying to build services for one, helps people in their day-to-day lives and hopefully save the freaking planet in the next upcoming climate change catastrophe the rest of our lives.
Chris Adams: Hello and welcome to Environment Variables, brought to you by the Green Software Foundation. In each episode, we discuss the latest news and events surrounding green software. On our show, you can expect candid conversations with top experts in their field who have a passion for how to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions of software.
I'm your host, Chris Adams. Hello, and welcome to another episode of The Week in Green Software, where we bring you the latest news and updates from the world of sustainable software development. I'm your host, Chris Adams, and in this episode we'll be discussing generative AI worrying impact that I could be having on the environment.
We'l...
Learn more about our people:
Find out more about the GSF:
News:
- Generative AI and cloud zombies: Raising the alarm about global climate impact: / Silicon Angle [2:48]
- Report on ChatGPT Model’s Emissions Offers Rare Glimpse of AI’s Climate Impacts: / Truthout.org [2:48]
- Xbox’s New Energy Measurement Tools are World Changing: / Xbox [6:23]
- Wagtail and the summer of code / GitHub [14:32]
- LF Energy Summit ( June 1 at 2:05 pm - 2:35 pm CET • Paris & Virtual) [19:35]
- GreenTech Southwest Meetup (April 20, 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm • Bristol & Virtual) [20:00]
- PS5 Power Consumption / ecoenergygeek [10:58]
- The UK’s Digital Markets, Competition and Consumer Bill / Linklaters Sustainable Futures [20:16]
- The Carbon Reduction Opportunity of Moving to Amazon Web Services / 451 Research [21:02]
- Follow, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts
- Follow and rate on Spotify
- Watch our videos on The Green Software Foundation YouTube Channel!
- Connect with us on Twitter, Github and LinkedIn!
Aerin Booth: When I think about anything we choose to do, not only in terms of carbon and IT, but in our life, if it doesn't have purpose, it's almost a waste. And we forget that we're not really building things for ourselves in technology. We're trying to build services for one, helps people in their day-to-day lives and hopefully save the freaking planet in the next upcoming climate change catastrophe the rest of our lives.
Chris Adams: Hello and welcome to Environment Variables, brought to you by the Green Software Foundation. In each episode, we discuss the latest news and events surrounding green software. On our show, you can expect candid conversations with top experts in their field who have a passion for how to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions of software.
I'm your host, Chris Adams. Hello, and welcome to another episode of The Week in Green Software, where we bring you the latest news and updates from the world of sustainable software development. I'm your host, Chris Adams, and in this episode we'll be discussing generative AI worrying impact that I could be having on the environment.
We'l...
Chris Adams is joined by cloud sustainability advocate and founder of Cloud Sustainably, Aerin Booth in this episode of TWiGS brought to you by the Green Software Foundation. On this episode Aerin provides his insight into the cloud to discuss cloud zombies, the effect that generative AI is having on the environment and exciting developments from Xbox (including a list of some of Aerin’s favourite nostalgic games!). We also touch on GreenOps and the future for green software developers.
Learn more about our people:
Find out more about the GSF:
News:
Aerin Booth: When I think about anything we choose to do, not only in terms of carbon and IT, but in our life, if it doesn't have purpose, it's almost a waste. And we forget that we're not really building things for ourselves in technology. We're trying to build services for one, helps people in their day-to-day lives and hopefully save the freaking planet in the next upcoming climate change catastrophe the rest of our lives.
Chris Adams: Hello and welcome to Environment Variables, brought to you by the Green Software Foundation. In each episode, we discuss the latest news and events surrounding green software. On our show, you can expect candid conversations with top experts in their field who have a passion for how to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions of software.
I'm your host, Chris Adams. Hello, and welcome to another episode of The Week in Green Software, where we bring you the latest news and updates from the world of sustainable software development. I'm your host, Chris Adams, and in this episode we'll be discussing generative AI worrying impact that I could be having on the environment.
We'l...
Learn more about our people:
Find out more about the GSF:
News:
- Generative AI and cloud zombies: Raising the alarm about global climate impact: / Silicon Angle [2:48]
- Report on ChatGPT Model’s Emissions Offers Rare Glimpse of AI’s Climate Impacts: / Truthout.org [2:48]
- Xbox’s New Energy Measurement Tools are World Changing: / Xbox [6:23]
- Wagtail and the summer of code / GitHub [14:32]
- LF Energy Summit ( June 1 at 2:05 pm - 2:35 pm CET • Paris & Virtual) [19:35]
- GreenTech Southwest Meetup (April 20, 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm • Bristol & Virtual) [20:00]
- PS5 Power Consumption / ecoenergygeek [10:58]
- The UK’s Digital Markets, Competition and Consumer Bill / Linklaters Sustainable Futures [20:16]
- The Carbon Reduction Opportunity of Moving to Amazon Web Services / 451 Research [21:02]
- Follow, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts
- Follow and rate on Spotify
- Watch our videos on The Green Software Foundation YouTube Channel!
- Connect with us on Twitter, Github and LinkedIn!
Aerin Booth: When I think about anything we choose to do, not only in terms of carbon and IT, but in our life, if it doesn't have purpose, it's almost a waste. And we forget that we're not really building things for ourselves in technology. We're trying to build services for one, helps people in their day-to-day lives and hopefully save the freaking planet in the next upcoming climate change catastrophe the rest of our lives.
Chris Adams: Hello and welcome to Environment Variables, brought to you by the Green Software Foundation. In each episode, we discuss the latest news and events surrounding green software. On our show, you can expect candid conversations with top experts in their field who have a passion for how to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions of software.
I'm your host, Chris Adams. Hello, and welcome to another episode of The Week in Green Software, where we bring you the latest news and updates from the world of sustainable software development. I'm your host, Chris Adams, and in this episode we'll be discussing generative AI worrying impact that I could be having on the environment.
We'l...
Previous Episode
The Week in Green Software: Netflix, Refurbishment and Anti-Greenwashing Laws
On this episode of The Week in Green Software, Chris Adams and Asim Hussain discuss the latest research on streaming emissions from Netflix and DIMPACT, the environmental impact of refurbished tech from Back Market, The European Commission's Right to Repair Law and their proposal for an Anti Greenwashing Law which is being echoed across the channel with the UK’s Digital Markets, Competition and Consumer Bill. Asim also discovers an alternative to central heating with his hot TV! The usual exciting resources and events in the show notes from TWiGS, Environment Variables and the Green Software Foundation.
Learn more about our people:
News:
- What the Latest Research on Streaming Emissions Tells Us / Netflix [2:39]
- The environmental impact of refurbished tech / Back Market [13:21]
- The European Commission's Right to Repair Law / European Commission [17:58]
- Microsoft wants to export 'grid-interactive' Dublin datacenter setup / Microsoft [23:31]
- The European Commission's Anti Greenwashing Law Proposal / European Commission [36:20]
- The UK’s Digital Markets, Competition and Consumer Bill / Linklaters Sustainable Futures [38:06]
- Table that Chris refers to from ADEME [14:19]
- ADEME Study on the Impact of Refurbished Electronics / ADEME [14:19]
- The Restart Project Podcast [20:27]
- US Right to Repair Law from 2022 / Reuters [21:21]
- Balancing Power Systems With Datacenters Using a Virtual Interconnector Balancing / Conor Kelly [24:31]
- Ecovisor / Ecovisor [26:21]
- Follow, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts
- Follow and rate on Spotify
- Watch our videos on The Green Software Foundation YouTube Channel!
- Connect with us on Twitter, Github and LinkedIn!
Chris Adams: Turning bauxite into aluminum is incredibly energy intensive. It's in terms of density of load versus the area used. The only thing that is greater than it is data centers.
Asim Hussain: Oh, alright.
Chris Adams: Yeah. Or maybe Bitcoin mining, but you can, they probably count as a data center as well. But basically, yeah, incredibly dense load, which is why you see this, and this really spelled out to me just how big a player some of these large companies are now.
Hello, and welcome to Environment Variables, brought to you by the Green So...
Next Episode
The Week in Green Software: The Hidden Cost of AI
This week host Chris Adams is joined by Asim Hussain and Environment Variables regular Sara Bergman to discuss the hidden costs of generative AI. What’s really at the tip of this iceberg and how far down does it go? They also discuss just how thirsty AI chatbots really are and developments in platform engineering. Finally, we share some opportunities for development from the world of green software.
Learn more about our people:
- Chris Adams: LinkedIn / GitHub / Website
- Sara Bergman: LinkedIn / Twitter
- Asim Hussain: LinkedIn / Twitter
News:
- AI Chatbots Guzzle Enormous Amounts of Water, Study Finds: / Evening Standard [3:16]
- Two-phase cooling will be hit by EPA rules and 3M's exit from PFAS "forever chemicals" / DCD [9:35]
- The Mounting Human and Environmental Costs of Generative AI: / Ars Technica [15:02]
- ChatGPT: Mayor starts legal bid over false bribery claim / BBC [20:29]
- Free Dolly: Introducing the World's First Truly Open Instruction-Tuned LLM / DataBricks [25:19]
- How Platform Engineering Makes Software Sustainable: / Devops.com [30:43]
- How much water do data centers use? / David Mytton [8:10]
- Making AI Less “Thirsty”: Uncovering and Addressing the Secret Water Footprint of AI Models / Back Market / UC Riverside & UT Arlington [9:28]
- Jevon’s Paradox / Wikipedia [14:24]
- The AI Iceberg / Ars Technica [22:54]
- Simon Willison’s Blog about Dolly [25:37]
- Breaking the code of silence: what we learned from content moderators at the landmark Berlin summit / Foxglove [28:03]
- Holly Cummins from Red Hat’s Speech at QCon London 2023 [32:34]
- Meetup on How to measure energy consumption of software (April 24, Virtual) / Green Coding Berlin [35:11]
- Microsoft India’s Green Software Development Hackathon (March 21 – April 24, 2023 • Virtual): [36:13]
- GreenTech Southwest Meetup (April 20, 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm • Bristol & Virtual): / Green Web Foundation [37:00]
Asim Hussain: I'm talking to people in my family, in fact, who are like thinking, will I have a job in two years time? Will I have a job in three years time? And like as historically, we have ignored in the just transition the other side have created a lot of very unpleasant noises, which has forced us to deal with that.
I think th...
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