Simon WillisonApr 29, 2025

I'm glad somebody out there is brave enough to push back against the "personal ChatGPT usage is terrible for the environment" message https://andymasley.substack.com/p/a-cheat-sheet-for-conversations-about

"If you want to prompt ChatGPT 40 times, you can just stop your shower 1 second early."

"If I choose not to take a flight to Europe, I save 3,500,000 ChatGPT searches. this is like stopping more than 7 people from searching ChatGPT for their entire lives."

Using ChatGPT is not bad for the environment - a cheat sheet

The numbers clearly show this is a pointless distraction for the climate movement

Andy Masley
Show threadSimon WillisonMay 6, 2025
Here's a follow-up by someone with a whole lot more credibility than myself or Andy: Hannah Ritchie is "Head of Research at Our World in Data, and a Senior Researcher at the University of Oxford" and runs a high quality sustainable energy blog https://www.sustainabilitybynumbers.com/p/carbon-footprint-chatgpt
What's the carbon footprint of using ChatGPT?

Very small compared to most of the other stuff you do.

Sustainability by numbers
Show threadCarlton Gibson 🇪🇺May 6, 2025

@simon Thanks for sharing! That graph about half-way down is quite telling...

> …if we’re fretting over a few queries a day while having a beef burger for dinner, heating our homes with a gas boiler, and driving a petrol car, we will get nowhere.

Show threadAndrea Grandi 🦕May 6, 2025
@carlton @simon I see at least 6 from the "important" ones which can't be just delegated to the people choice (some are a "luxury" many people can't afford, some need government help etc...). And I'm not saying the chart is wrong. I'm saying that if true, we are getting nowhere, regardless of LLM 😕
Show threadCarlton Gibson 🇪🇺

@andreagrandi @simon AFAICT the consensus among activists who know about this sort of thing is that, you're right, we're not getting anywhere.

This was a good read:

https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v47/n02/brett-christophers/so-much-for-paris

As well as the pieces mentioned, the author there has a book "The Price Is Wrong" which outlines the dynamics, somewhat depressingly.

Brett Christophers · So much for Paris: Climate Overshoot

All fossil fuel projects are politically constituted. Either they are state projects, controlled and administered by...

London Review of Books
May 6, 2025 at 1:58pmWeb