Bill Gates has claimed that artificial intelligence will be more of a help than a hindrance in achieving climate goals, despite growing concern that a surge in new datacentres could drain green energy supplies.
The philanthropist and Microsoft co-founder told journalists that AI would enable countries to use less energy, even as they require more data centres, by making technology and electricity grids more efficient.
Gates downplayed fears over AI’s climate impact after mounting concerns that the tech breakthrough could lead to a surge in energy demand and require more fossil fuels as a result.
“Let’s not go overboard on this,” Gates said. “Datacentres are, in the most extreme case, a 6% addition [in energy demand] but probably only 2 to 2.5%. The question is will AI accelerate a more than 6% reduction? And the answer is: certainly,” he said.
A query on the AI chatbot tool ChatGPT needs nearly 10 times as much electricity to process as a Google search, according to estimates by Goldman Sachs, which could mean carbon emissions from datacentres more than doubling between 2022 and 2030.
Some expert estimates have claimed that an increase in the number of AI datacentres could cause electricity demand to rise by up to 10% in developed countries, after years of declining energy due to greater efficiency.
Gates told journalists at a London conference hosted by his venture fund Breakthrough Energy that the extra demand created by AI datacentres was more likely to be matched by new investments in green electricity because tech companies were “seriously willing” to pay extra to use clean electricity sources in order “to say that they’re using green energy”.
“The tech companies are the [ones] willing to pay a premium, and to help bootstrap green energy capacity,” he added.
Breakthrough Energy has invested in more than 100 companies involved in the energy transition. Gates is also a major investor in AI via the Gates Foundation, which invests about a third of its $77bn (£61bn) wealth in Microsoft.
Gates warned that despite advances in AI and green electricity tech, the world was likely to miss its 2050 climate targets by up to 15 years because the amount of green electricity needed to phase out fossil fuels was not coming forward quickly enough.
He told the Guardian that a delay in the rollout of green energy could hinder the decarbonisation of polluting sectors, including heavy industry, making a 2050 target to reach “net zero” emissions more difficult to achieve.
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“I worry, in general, that the amount of green electricity that we need for the transition is not going to show up nearly as fast as we need,” Gates said.
“If you try to map out and say: ‘Let’s get to zero by 2050,’ you’re like: ‘Another 10 or 15 years might be more realistic.’ It’s very hard to see. We’re not going to get to zero by 2050, I don’t think,” he added.
Gates’ warning came a week after a major global report found that despite a record rise in renewable energy in 2023, consumption of fossil fuels also climbed to a new record high as a result of steadily rising demand.
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