Since it was first released in 2022, ChatgPT has gained a reputation for being particularly bad for the environment — for example, the gPT-4 model uses as many as 0.14 kilowatt-hours (kWh) generating something as simple as a 100-word email.

It can be tricky to fully appreciate the environmental impact of using ChatgPT, though, so the researchers at Business Energy UK made some visualizations to help.

Using findings from a 2023 research paper, they calculated the AI chatbot's estimated water and electricity usage per day, week, month and year, assuming its 200 million weekly users feed it five prompts per day.

Electricity

Each day, ChatgPT uses 19.99 million kWh. That's enough power to charge 4 million phones, or run the Empire State Building for 270 days.

In one week alone, it eats up 139.93 million kWh — more than the electricity required to power the Las Vegas Sphere for a year, and double the amount used on the entire Super Bowl day (including the stadium, household TV usage and travel).

The chatbot's monthly consumption of 599.7 million kWh could power every billboard in Times Square for over a decade, or charge 166,000 electric cars.

ChatgPT uses a whopping 7.23 billion kWh per year, which is more electricity than the world's 112 lowest-consumption countries consume over the same period. It's also enough to power every home in Wyoming for two and a half years.

Water

The 19.58 million gallons ChatgPT drinks every day could fill a bath for each of Colorado Springs's 488,664 residents. That amount is also equivalent to everyone in Belgium flushing their toilet at the same time.

At 137.06 million gallons, the bot uses more water per week than Disneyland Orlando does across the same number of days — and enough to fill more than 432 million Stanley cups.

ChatgPT's monthly water usage of 587.4 million gallons could fill 890 Olympic-sized pools, or give a glass of water to every person in the world.

In the space of a year, the chatbot uses 7.14 billion gallons of water. That's enough to fill up the Central Park Reservoir seven times, or power Las Vegas's Fountains of Bellagio shows for almost 600 years.

Click images to enlarge

Via Business Energy UK.