Muchas comunidades que viven cerca de los Centros de Datos se quedan sin acceso a agua o energía porque se la llevan estas instalaciones. «Es el momento para Europa de dejar de complacer a las Big Tech y comenzar a regular los Centros de Datos» @jillmcardle.bsky.social @beyondfossilfuels.bsky.social

After all the dismissiveness and misleading presentation of growth rates, there's basically no escaping the fact that US data centre growth is a globally significant story that is directly incentivising new fossil fuel use and infrastructure growth Feeling pretty vindicated, given last year's WEO

I had a wonderful week reconnecting w old friends and meeting new ones at #ClimateWeek in NYC. AI and data centers dominated many of the conversations, and my mind reels at the vast discrepancies among the "expert takes" on where we are headed.

In the US, capacity auction prices - paid via costs passed on to consumers by utilities - are set to soar off the back of rocketing energy demand from data centres. Hardly seems fair that household energy bills will be used to help line the pockets of tech giants. www.reuters.com/business/ene...

Big Tech CEOs are hungry for power, but that can’t come at the expense of the planet. All new data centres must run on renewable energy, and their growth needs to align with planetary boundaries. 👀 @jillmcardle.bsky.social @re-publica.com 👉 www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Fmz...

When it IS clean energy that powers the data centers, it’s nearly always taken from an existing pool that already had customers, so those customers now have to use dirty power. www.propublica.org/article/data...

Most of this power is fossil-fueled, which means that emissions have skyrocketed. Bloomberg reported in 2024 that without the shell game of Renewable Energy Credits (RECs), “Amazon could be forced to admit that its 2022 emissions are.. three times what the company disclosed.” archive.is/lBf5H

Today Amazon released its “Sustainability” report. Predictably, what it leaves out is vastly more important than what it says. Amazon is building a dirty energy empire, spending literally hundreds of billions on data centers that will rely primarily on new fossil fuel infrastructure.

Sharing this via @jillmcardle.bsky.social on LinkedIn because it’s just PERFECT👌🏻👌🏻👌🏻

The Political Economy of Artificial Intelligence: How Generative AI Threatens the Renewable Energy Transition Organised by AlgorithmWatch with @spielkamp.bsky.social (moderator), @jillmcardle.bsky.social, Fanny Hidvégi, Claude Turmes, Boris Ruf More info: cpdp.be/4117 #CPDP2025 #TheWorldisWatching

ICYMI 👀 New @greenpeaceeastasia.bsky.social video on the dark side of AI, featuring @jillmcardle.bsky.social on the risks posed by largely AI-driven data centre electricity consumption in Europe.

"The energy consumption of 🇪🇺 data centres is putting local energy transitions at risk, either by expanding gas infrastructure or forcing other sectors to rely on power from fossil fuels," says @jillmcardle.bsky.social in new @greenpeaceeastasia.bsky.social video. 👀 www.youtube.com/watch?v=ySfh...

Tech companies manufacture demand for chatbots and image generation, and then that in turn manufactures demand for coal and gas. Blistering @desmog.bsky.social piece here detailing this new and disgusting symbiosis www.desmog.com/2025/04/22/a...

@jillmcardle.bsky.social points out here the IEA is basically adopting the logic of carbon offsetting into the world of AI and data centres www.linkedin.com/posts/jillmc...

Today's report on #AI and energy by the @iea.org's largely confirms our analysis published earlier this year, data centre growth is rapidly increasing & leading to more emissions. Read our report and learn about their impact on emissions & the energy transition. beyondfossilfuels.org/2025/02/10/s...

Ireland is interesting. Being a nexus of data centre growth it's not surprising to see rising power demand. but much of it is being met by power imports, not new renewables, or fossil fuel output. bsky.app/profile/keta... CC @hannahdaly.ie @jillmcardle.bsky.social

The headline you won't read today about the European Court of Auditors report on EU funding for NGOs is that the auditors found no wrong-doing by NGOs, nor any breach of EU values. An invented scandal to justify cutting EU funding for NGOs and distract from genuine cases of corruption.

You can’t sue a rainbow 🌈 No matter what happens in any courtroom – our global intersectional climate movement will only keep growing stronger and louder 💚🌎 #WeWillNotBeSilenced

As promised, here are the slides I shared with students to convince them to NOT use chatGPT and other artificial stupidity. TL;DR? AI is evil, unsustainable and stupid, and I'd much rather they use their own brains, make their own mistakes, and actually learn something. 🪄

"AI may exist in the virtual world, but it has real life consequences, and this (BFF) new research should be a wake-up call that sustainable and limitless AI growth is a fantasy," say @jillmcardle.bsky.social & Julia Pazos in latest The Green Fix post 👉 thegreenfix.substack.com/p/ai?utm%5C_...

This headline sounds positive when in fact the regulator has just proposed that data centre growth can continue as long as energy demand is met by their own oil and gas generation. Any pretence to supporting renewable energy has been dropped. www.irishtimes.com/business/202...

🎭 A magician never reveals their secrets—but we just did. EPH’s “coal exit” looks like a ruse, shifting polluting assets to its sister company, but behind the scenes it's still turning dirty coal profits. Read our new research in partnership with Re-set: beyondfossilfuels.org/2025/02/12/b...

"If the data centre growth relies on fossil gas, it will fuel the climate crisis. To prevent this, expansion must go hand in hand with the buildout of additional renewable energy," says @jillmcardle.bsky.social on the risks surging data centre electricity demand. www.euronews.com/next/2025/02...

🧵1/ Between crypto, the cloud & AI, the digital world is growing fast. Today’s #AIActionSummit is convening world leaders and industry executives to discuss its future. We're calling on them to tackle one of the tech industry’s biggest threats: its soaring power demand. 👇

Two other possible outcomes - less likely but definitely worth fighting for, I reckon: - Tech companies must only ever build new clean energy, but that clean energy must itself not be sucking the life from decarbonisation, electrification and energy transition - DON'T BUILD SO MANY DATA CENTRES

Huge new @beyondfossilfuels.bsky.social report - EU's data centre frenzy could enable 121 megatonnes of CO2-e "New data centre demand alone could consume as much as the added power needed for the electrification of the entire transport sector in the EU by 2030" @jillmcardle.bsky.social

Today we launched a new report on how data centres could derail the energy transition in Europe: new data centres risk increasing emissions in Europe - they must be powered by additional renewable energy or they must not be built 🤖⛽

Another reminder that we are not debating nuclear v renewables for #DataCentre #AI growth, we are talking about fossil fuels v renewables, and one of those options means we may miss our climate and emissions targets. I will let you guess which one 🤨 www.ft.com/content/63c3...

Big Tech is investing in #nuclearpower to meet AI data centre energy demands, despite it being "completely off topic" as a current solution for powering data centres, @jillmcardle.bsky.social tells @businessinsider.com. Read the story 👉

I spoke to Business Insider to dismantle some of the hype around nuclear Nuclear is "completely off topic" as a solution for powering data centers, particularly if tech companies are serious about the 2030 deadlines they've set to meet emissions targets www.businessinsider.com/big-tech-nuc...

The most sensible headline yet. #DataCentres growth driven by #AI is costing us the climate. Growth cannot continue unless a) we make sure DCs run 100% on real renewables and b) we urgently scale up renewables for all sectors irishtimes.com/opinion/edit...

Our renewables revolution was planned to get our communities off polluting, expensive fossil fuels, not to shortsightedly serve the unlimited expansion of one colossal industry.

'As data centre demand has expanded at the same rate as renewables generation, renewables are not delivering net reductions in fossil fuels use in power generation.' So much for the argument that unrestrained data centre growth will help the energy transition

Hello everyone, this is all playing out exactly as we warned: nuclear gets used as a rhetorical empty future promise while big tech companies actively and knowingly increase the climate damage they're enabling today www.theregister.com/2024/12/05/m...

"The rapid growth of data centres is creating the clear threat of dragging Europe back towards fossil fuels at the expense of the climate" - @jillmcardle.bsky.social at @beyondfossilfuels.bsky.social Both the renewable / nuclear promises are shallow -->>> beyondfossilfuels.org/2024/12/04/p...

"Between 2017 and 2023, nearly all growth in renewable electricity was matched by increased demand, almost entirely driven by data centres. As a result, fossil fuel use has not declined, and emissions remain stubbornly high." www.irishtimes.com/environment/...

2 recent stories: - Amazon promising carbon removal *inside* its data centres - Meta asking for nuclear power proposals for its data centres Different techs, but the same dynamic: the techs are in what I am going to call the 'greenwashing habitable zone'..... www.semafor.com/article/12/0...

Data centre squad IEA Paris road trip achieved ✅🤓⚡️

Tech companies now have an opportunity - and duty - to ensure that data centre electricity demand is met sustainably. It is imperative that Europe stays on a path to phase out fossil fuels by 2035. 7/7 @jillmcardle.bsky.social

Wow. Literally witnessing progress in reverse

Since 2017, electricity consumption at the biggest AI makers has soared: 186% at Google 186% at Microsoft 367% at Meta The reason: AI. @agordon.me examines the electrical costs of AI in the first episode of our YouTube series on the climate impacts of AI. www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFd0...

We’re off to the @iea.org #AI & Energy forum today to ask how are ask these #DataCentres going to be powered? Spoiler: if it’s gas we’re in big trouble 🔌🤖

DC growth is already outpacing renewables in places like Ireland. Looking forward to being at @iea.org tomorrow to discuss how exactly we will ensure that the #AI / #DataCentre boom is not powered by fossil fuels 🔌🤖⛽

I was asked by @thejournal.ie was the near wipeout of the Greens in #GE24 a vote against #ClimateAction and what were the prospects for action under an FF / FG led government. My take: "Climate change hasn't gone away you know" www.thejournal.ie/readme/green...

How best to incentivise new clean energy? No, it's not strong government subsidies, clean power mandates, fossil phase-out and loans. Just build 392024842 red-hot overpowered text and image spam engines

Amazing #BlackFriday #MakeAmazonPay

🧵Major investigation by the Journal reveals extent of data centre pollution and reliance on dirty fossil fuels. Our politicians must press pause on dirty data centre expansion until threats to security and climate has been removed.