Air Conditioning, Not Data Centers, Driving Global Energy Demand Growth (technologyreview.com) 63
Air conditioning will contribute more to rising global energy demand than data centers through 2030, according to an International Energy Agency. While attention has focused on computing power consumption, the IEA projects data centers will account for less than 10% of increased energy demand by 2030, significantly less than space cooling requirements. Global cooling degree days, a measure of air conditioning need, were 6% higher in 2024 than 2023 and 20% above the long-term average for the first two decades of the century.
China, India and the United States saw particularly sharp increases. Air conditioning represented 7% of global electricity consumption in 2022, with some U.S. regions reporting that cooling can comprise over 70% of residential energy use during peak periods. The number of air conditioning units worldwide could nearly triple from fewer than 2 billion in 2016 to approximately 6 billion by 2050, creating a growing challenge for power grids.
China, India and the United States saw particularly sharp increases. Air conditioning represented 7% of global electricity consumption in 2022, with some U.S. regions reporting that cooling can comprise over 70% of residential energy use during peak periods. The number of air conditioning units worldwide could nearly triple from fewer than 2 billion in 2016 to approximately 6 billion by 2050, creating a growing challenge for power grids.
Vicious cycle (Score:2)
People don't care about their future self.
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Their future selves will be fine, it's their future offspring that will bare the brunt of the decisions of this generation.
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Re:Vicious cycle (Score:4, Insightful)
First off, this report is missing the changes that are being quickly adopted by homeowners, heat pumps are changing the power used.
Second, computers need AC, so this is weird shit.
Third, the assumption that power from renewables isnt increasing (it is), that is being made by these two debbie downers above me, is weird.
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heat pumps are changing the power used.
... Which one of us wants to be the one who tells him that "heat pumps" are airconditioners...
Second, computers need AC, so this is weird shit.
The point of TFA is that residential heating/cooling is going to be the bigger contributor. When ever anyone talks about datacentres they include the cooling system in the power requirements.
Third, the assumption that power from renewables isnt increasing (it is)
That assumption is something not at all relevant to the story. It doesn't matter what the source of energy is, the story is about what is driving the increasing energy demand. This isn't a story about green energy or climate ch
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Re: Vicious cycle (Score:2)
Somebody needs to design a highly insulated canopy bed type enclosure that will run on a few hundred watts, cool the outer room to 90, bed up 65. People would save a fortune.
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People don't care about their future self.
If that were true then nobody would attend university for the opportunity for a higher paying job in the future. If true then nobody would invest in a retirement account, presumably not caring that their future self would likely live a short and painful life for not having food, shelter, and medical care as they reach their twilight years. They may have so little care of the future that they don't bother with buying air conditioning since right now, for much of the northern hemisphere, the weather is stil
If I had a nickle ... (Score:2)
If I had a nickle every time I wished I could go back in time and kick my own ass.
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If I had a nickle every time I wished I could go back in time and kick my own ass.
(Anyone over 40, speaking to anyone else over 40) ”Looking back, how smart and experienced would you say your 18-year old self was, with regards to the real world?”
(99% of responses) “Oh, I was an absolute fucking moron back then as compared to today. It’s downright scary how ignorant I was. I thought I had a clue. Living and gaining life experience, taught me a hell of a lot.”
And yet, we have people still defending the right for a teenage mind to cast votes to select lead
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And yet, we have people still defending the right for a teenage mind to cast votes to select leadership in our country? Even the person in the mirror agrees that’s fucking stupid.
You learn by doing. Ages 15 to 24 make up about 13% of the population. Voting wise they are likely more statistical noise than are consistently voting along party lines. Their impact to an election is likely pretty insignificant. (I'm not suggesting that people under 18 get to vote, but those are the numbers I had to work with).
I think some basic civics lessons that have a standardized national bar should be part of every public school. People need to understand how their government works and how the proces
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And this is why it will take some heavy handed approach or catastrophic event to have action.
So, like you said, nothin's gonna happen.
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"People don't care about their future self."
And, they shouldn't. Old people regret not enjoying their youth just as much as their lack of planning in youth.
AC vs PC ? Or AC + PC ? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Every Data Center needs HVAC (averaging about 40% of Data Centers' energy use), as well as most other new construction. So it's no surprise that A/C electrical use is growing faster than Data Center electrical use.
POWER FACTOR (Score:1)
TL;DR: It's not PC and it's not AC. Let's talk energy and then HVAC.
If you live in the United States and are in a residential spot, none of this really matters. I'll explain but don't want to bore people who don't care, yet read these responses and are insulting. Insult away.
E
Energy:
So anything that "does work" be it mechanical, electronic, phase-change (think ice machine), etc. means that energy is being used. It doesn't matter what form that energy comes in as (usually electric) and energy goes out (u
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It's negligible compared to the sum of other air conditioning and negligible compared to the power used by the servers. Just calculate like 110% of the server power and you don't need to add the AC separately.
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What about the air conditioning of data centers ?
Far more than 1,000 people can likely survive on the capabilities of a single data center. In a single building supported with one large A/C system built very well, and designed for redundancy.
You aren’t heating and cooling even 100 people with that same level of effeciency outside a data center. Not saying cooling data centers isn’t a problem. It’s just already been made about as efficient as it can. You want less data centers? Remind people the delete button on the keyboard isn
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The whole of the U.S. produces about 2,750 TWh of electric energy every year. At the same time, the Sun sends about 90,000,000 TWh to the surface area of the U.S.. And while about 70% of that gets reflected in the atmosphere, the U.S. still gets more than 10,000 times the energy from the Sun than it dissipates from using electric energy.
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That's exactly right. Of course energy consumption by the entire population will be greater than by the entitled wealthy, that's doesn't mean we shouldn't be offended by the wastefulness of billionaires.
Fair is fair? (Score:2)
Time to focus on new A/C tech? (Score:4, Interesting)
There is an old video [youtube.com] on YouTube about using a combination of phase changes and desiccant to get the COP (Coefficient of performance) up there, or at least be able to have energy available from a different source (like solar concentrators) to power the refrigerant cycle.
A/Cs have economies of scale. Perhaps consider water chilling, which allows two (for redundancy) coolers to be used for an entire campus, as opposed to A/C units for everything. Couple that with CRACs, so 2n+1 redundancy is maintained, and this can help greatly with energy costs.
Then, perhaps passive means. White rooftops or solar panels can do a lot to deal with heat. Solar panels, assuming the ones that are using a frame, have some dead air space between the panel and the roof, so the only way it can conduct heat is via the mounts, IIRC, lowering temperatures by ~5 degrees.
Solid state refrigerants are useful as well, just because it means fewer moving parts.
Overall, there are a lot of technologies waiting in the wings to make A/C a lot less energy demanding, it just needs people with deep pockets to finance it.
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I think ctilsie242 was plenty focused on practical thermodynamics.
1. Using dessicant instead: dehumidification via HVAC is energy expensive. It involves cooling the moisture down to the dew point, condensing it, which also means moving the latent heat to actually condense it. Comparatively, a dessicant system using something like silica beads can be almost energy free if you use heat from the evaporator coils to regenerate them because you avoid the phase and temperature changes that actively cost energy
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Yeah, but if you have solar panels powering conventional A/C, already "the sunnier the day the more they work". It is not clear that some alternative direct heating approach would have better efficiency than solar cells plus electric pump based A/C.
I have solar panels and I rarely import power on the hottest days. What is more (for those without solar panels) the wholesale energy price is often negative during the hottest part of summer days.
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Yes, but while it depends on the area - specifically the local humidity, an AC system with desiccant could use half the energy for a given amount of cooling by cutting out the energy expensive dehumidification. Meaning you'd need half the solar panels, which is still potentially quite a bit of savings today. Would leave panel space for an EV, for example.
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But all the above need serious development to compete with traditional HVAC on cost, thus the call for investment.
Meanwhile, Greed N. Corruption is casually polishing his Patent War Chest with another coat of freshly squeezed tears flowing from Ingenuity and Innovation, doing fuck-all with endless patents except waiting for the lawsuit.
(Needless to say it takes more than just a new design in the 21st Century, which has crippled our ability to innovate.)
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That is the ironic thing. When refrigeration was first invented, a major ice house grabbed the patent and sat it on it for 20 years to ensure that no refrigeration could happen under it until that expired.
NEWTON'S SECOND LAW (Score:1)
Conservation of energy is one of those things Isaac Newton published and it hasn't been debunked since.
To put it in layman terms the energey of a system is a constant. It can be converted, changed, phased or
stored, but it's still there.
If you have a data center and there's NOTHING IN IT then no power goes in (let's pretend the lights are off)
and nothing comes out.
Add a LOAD. Any LOAD. Could be a server rack. Could be one server. Could be a lonely little laptop.
Hey could even be something drawing just o
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Or better isolation. The least energy to get heat out is needed if the heat doesn't get in first place.
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I would say that insulation is a major thing as well. Making stuff like aerogel insulation or stuff with high R-value which isn't insanely toxic or itchy would help things. Running an IR scan of a house can help here, as well as going to triple pane windows.
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AC tech is already massively efficient from a thermodynamic point of view. It's time to focus on the application:
a) Should we be building more AC in leaky houses with no insulation?
b) Should you expect it to be cold enough to wear a jumper indoors while it's warm outside (looking to you America I can't believe how cold I felt in the Texan summer heat)
c) Should we bring back the concept of doors instead of relying on ACs to push air curtains at shopping centre entrances?
Yeah (Score:1)
Pacific Northwest (west side of the mountains). We really don't need AC here. On a few days, it would be nice. But we can get by without it.
So now the greenies* are trying to ban gas heat. Nooo! Gas is bad! Get a heat pump. So much more efficient. But given our energy rates, heat pumps are just barely a break even with gas heat. But hey, good for the environment. Except that our utility sells both gas and electricity. And they make a hell of a lot more on the electricity, which they generate with gas turbi
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A punitive tax on "gas heat" would solve your problem, heat pumps would then be far better than "barely a break even".
Capitalism will not solve the destruction of the commons, it's what causes it. You need to understand that. It's not a conspiracy to get you to use air conditioning, you moron.
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A punitive tax on "gas heat" would solve your problem,
I don't have a problem. Make me switch to a heat pump and the gas will still get burned. Just by the power company so they can sell me electricity.
You need to understand that. It's not a conspiracy to get you to use air conditioning, you moron.
Yes it is, you PSE shill. The commons still gets destroyed. But your employer makes a few extra bucks along the way.
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I don't have a problem. Make me switch to a heat pump and the gas will still get burned. Just by the power company so they can sell me electricity.
If we assume natural gas "peaker" generation with about 30% efficiency on turning natural gas into electricity is used when heating is in high demand, and a common heat pump having a COP of about 3, then we end up with no reduction on natural gas consumed. Oh, there is some play on that given that natural gas heat will have some losses. A high efficiency furnace would be something like 95% efficiency, a natural draft furnace would be about 80% efficient. Heating with some kind of natural gas fireplace or
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A punitive tax on "gas heat" would solve your problem, heat pumps would then be far better than "barely a break even".
You do know that heat pumps are air conditioners? And air conditioners are heat pumps?
If you punish people for natural gas heat on the fringes of areas where air conditioning could be desirable then that means more people buying heat pumps to stay warm in the winter and then using that heat pump to cool their domicile in summer because the equipment is a sunk cost and electricity for cooling is cheap.
If anyone proposes somehow making electricity expensive to discourage cooling their domicile insummer then
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Pacific Northwest (west side of the mountains). We really don't need AC here.
I might use a loose definition of need, but I only wish that was true. My house gets basically zero shade from sunrise to sunset. Most everywhere I lived had at least some shade and wasn't near as bad. My garage peaks above 100F, with it usually sitting in the mid 90's, during the summer. My living room, windows open and no AC, usually runs 20-30F above outside. That means mid 80's most of the time and well into the 90's during the peaks. Even then, we used to be able to manage the summers better. We'd just
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Even then, we used to be able to manage the summers better. We'd just have to leave the house for a couple hours on the worst days. The last few years have been worse.
While growing up on the family farm I can recall on hot summer evenings Dad would have us all pile into the Buick for a sight seeing drive. Trips to the local swimming pool was how we'd cool off on hot summer days. The house didn't have air conditioning at the time but the Buick did so we did a lot of sightseeing from the car to keep cool.
This makes me wonder how people managed summer heat at the old farmhouse before cars had air conditioning, and there was no swimming pool in the nearest town. I'd guess
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Low nat gas prices are due to the tax subsidies oil companies receive, and of course not having to pay to clean up their pollution and its effects like climate change.
But it's a real barrier to heat pumps for regular folks. We're in VA and same issue here. Probably $20K to switch to a heat pump, but basically no change in operating costs. ROI return is basically Infinity.
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tax subsidies oil companies receive
Tax subsidies owners of ALL mineral deposits (or even timber) receive. Even lithium, nickel and rare earths (essential to renewable energy generation).
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Pacific Northwest (East side of the mountains).
The dichotomy is here too. I do have a heat pump and backup resistors as there is no natural gas service here. Propane is possible but expensive.
The Heat pump goes into heating mode in October and stays there until May. Last frost is taken as Mother's Day for planting purposes. First frost is variable, earliest was Sept 23 and latest was Nov 2 since I've been here.
Last year cooling mode was used for part of 22 days, typically from 3 to 8 PM. Occasionally 2 to 9
See bro? Let us build our AI data centers (Score:2)
I mean sure, each one we build uses as much power as your entire state, but trust us bro, it's your air conditioning that's the problem. Not our data center that uses more power than the rest of your state. We're building 8 of them because nobody said we can't.
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The beauty is that data center usage can be solved by building dedicated nuclear reactors while air conditioning use can be solved by destroying health care and the social safety net. The savings from canceling critical care for the disadvantaged can pay for the reactors, win win!
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20 square miles of solar panels per datacenter.
I guess they're technically correct (Score:2)
The data center cooling systems are also relatively inefficient and consume about 70% of the total energy used in a data center. [cc-techgroup.com]
So is the cooling necessary for data centers included in the data center part, or the AC part?
I was not able to confirm the "2,100 TWh" used for space cooling from the IEA link or any of the links from that page. This number is basically the linchpin of their entire premise so it'd be nice to actually find out where it comes from.
I'd also be interested to know how much of the "AC"
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"I'd also be interested to know how much of the "AC" they refer to is actually in the form of heat pumps, which have a net reduction in annual emissions because they displace local fossil fuel burning and/or inefficient electric resistance heat with grid power"
If the peak electrical load is in summer the heat pumps are not a solution. If the peak load is in winter they might be at least until the CoP drops so low the resistors cut in anyway.
Peak winter load here is about 11 GW, summer maybe 6 GW. Currently
AC (Score:2)
I recently visited FL for a couple of weeks. The good Lord granted a massive swamp .. a concrete base with grassy islands! FL has a lovely climate (apart from the hurricanes n that) and FL man deployed air conn with the ability to freeze air.
Cold dry air is not healthy - humans are used to atmospheric humidity - we are largely wetish breathing beasts. Temperature range from -20C to +40C is quite easily manageable if coupled with suitable humidity. Cold, dry, SHARED air is really crap. Now you have sh
At least A/C Aligns Better with Solar Power (Score:3)
as compared to data centres The biggest demand for cooling is mostly going to coincide with sunny days when solar power should be plentiful. The match isn't perfect---there are plenty of hot evenings after the sun has gone down---but it's better than data centres which tend to power on 24/7 to pay for all that expensive IT hardware ASAP.
The difficulty and expense with renewable energy is the storage needed to align generation with demand. Solar panels are dirt cheap but grid-scale batteries and pumped hydro are still very expensive. So A/C might use more electricity than data centres but still be less of a problem.
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Insulation is the key. If your building is decently insulated you can cool it when energy is plentiful, and then coast through periods when it is not. Typically overnight is a period of low demand, as well as during the day when we have cheap solar.
Aircon (Score:2)
Aircon generates a significant amount of heat that you could usefully use in any large scale. The problem - again - is that if everyone has a small aircon system, it all adds up and you can't gain from those smaller losses.
I live in a country where aircon isn't required at all.
But I do have it. Because heatpumps are far more effective than any other heating.
I have an all-electric house, and my heatpumps keep it warm for 200W (consistent average throughout the winter). In the summer they switch to aircon
Energy = Civilization (Score:2)
Obviously, we shouldn't waste energy needlessly - or really anything.
Phrases like "Global Energy Demand Growth" are positive things . Articles claiming otherwise are just completely clueless. Energy is civilization. From muscle-power to horse-power to water-power to steam-power all the way to nuclear power: More energy provides a higher standard of living.
Air conditioning - is that supposed to be a problem? Do you really want to live in a hot climate without it? If you want to raise the standard of living, raise the amount of cheap energy available. It runs everything f