People are in disbelief after discovering how much water ChatGPT uses for just one prompt.
It turns out the artificially intelligent chatbot is pretty thirsty - literally.
The huge sets of computers that are powering ChatGPT need a lot more water to power the public’s thirst for knowledge than was previously thought.
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In fact, it needs four times the amount of water that was first estimated.
This is because tech firms who are developing these new AIs need to use water for cooling.
According to a study conducted by experts at the University of California, Riverside, the AI needs around two liters of water to offer up 10 to 50 queries.
This revelation has caused a stir online, with many taking to social media to share their thoughts on the matter.
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On X, formerly Twitter, one user wrote: “I was in a workshop a few weeks ago and they talked about how harmful ChatGPT will be long term. One search uses as much electricity as leaving the lights on for like 20 minutes. I never even thought about that.”
This prompted a reply from another user who said: “Not only that, but, the computers require so much computing power, which generates so much heat, they use a LOT of water to keep them from overheating. Training ONE AI program for three weeks can require over 250,000 gallons. It’s harmful RIGHT NOW, let alone long-term.”
In the comment section, many people shared their reactions to the claims, with one person writing: “It’s nauseating how full steam ahead they are on more data centers here even though we don’t have the water and nobody in the community wants them. We are a very red area but everybody is politically united on this issue but the officials DGAF. Gotta be kick backs somewhere.”
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Another commented: “They want our air conditioning to be set to 80 degrees to help with preserving energy and they are wasting mountains of it on AI! But it’s all on us to do our part? It’s ridiculous.”
And a third added: “I feel so crazy. Like shouldn’t this just disqualify its use? Once we realized that it had this level of environmental impact we’d be like oh well, back to the drawing board! But no, capitalism. Sigh.”
But not everyone was as concerned, with one person pointing out: “History repeats itself. The device you tweeted this on used to take up a building and took 2x the time. Now it’s in your hand.”