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Behind AI Hype, Climate Consequences
AI’s massive energy use is giving fossil fuels a lifeline when they should be rapidly phased out in response to the climate emergency.
Nov 10, 2025
What started as rivulets of hype, hope, and alarm over artificial intelligence have combined into a tsunami-level wave washing over the American consciousness. ChatGPT is the most downloaded application in history, AI stock prices are hitting record market highs, and the American public is giddy about its potential technological upsides and devastated by its role in mental health crises.
Less discussed but deeply important are the AI boom’s clear and present dangers to our environment, health, and wallets.
That lack of attention to these issues is exactly how President Donald Trump, Big Tech, and the oil and gas industry want it.
As Trump attacks climate progress on all fronts, his administration is in lockstep pushing for a fast-tracked AI data center boom fed by gas and coal.
It’s critical that AI become part of global climate negotiations—not as an escape hatch for how it could save the planet, but as an urgent threat to people, wildlife, and the atmosphere.
It may not be immediately obvious, but AI is a gift to the fossil fuel industry. That’s because AI’s massive energy use is giving fossil fuels a lifeline when they should be rapidly phased out in response to the climate emergency.
It’s a huge problem for world leaders as they gather in Brazil for this year’s annual global climate talks, known as COP30. In one of the biggest shifts since last year’s talks, data center expansion to feed energy-intensive AI is straining grids and leading companies and some countries to walk back domestic climate pledges.
The Trump administration has cited the power-hungry AI beast as one big excuse for abandoning climate efforts, even as the US disproportionately leads the world in data center pollution.
And the great AI energy suck is just getting started, with dozens of massive new data centers slated for construction across the country—and hundreds more around the world. Mark Zuckerberg says one Meta data center will be the size of Manhattan. Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI, said recently, “I do guess that a lot of the world gets covered in data centers over time.”
These data centers demand immense amounts of power, land, and water for cooling. As one point of comparison, a ChatGPT AI search consumes 10 times as much energy as a normal Google search.
Just how bad could data center expansion be for the climate? That’s what we set out to find in our report, Data Crunch: How the AI Boom Threatens to Entrench Fossil Fuels and Compromise Climate Goals.
We found that plans for US data center growth, set to be powered primarily by fossil gas, as well as notoriously dirty coal, could triple by 2035. That comes with a huge cost to efforts to preserve a livable planet and limit the deadly flooding, extreme heat, and destructive fires of the climate emergency.
Unchecked, the fossil-fueled data center expansion could account for 10% of US economy-wide emissions and 44% of the power sector emissions allowable to meet the US climate target under the Paris Agreement.
With a gas-fed AI boom, all other electricity-consuming sectors, like homes and buildings, would need to cut their emissions by 60% more to keep pace with that target, set by former President Joe Biden and still in effect under Paris Agreement terms.
Amid all the hype and seeming inevitability of AI dominance, human beings have a chance now to proactively consider what relationship we want with this technology—and the environmental price we’re willing to pay.
If new AI data centers were instead powered by renewables like solar and wind, they’d be only 4% of power sector emissions and would barely affect our ability to meet the US climate goal.
Despite Trump exiting the Paris Agreement, Biden’s target stands as the United States’ contribution to global efforts to combat climate change.
While Trump dismisses climate change as a “con job,” there is broad scientific agreement that every degree of global heating worsens its deadly, destructive effects on people and wildlife.
A study last month found that accelerating climate harms mean that half a million people now die every year from extreme heat—an average of one person a minute.
The unbridled expansion of data centers to feed AI will only further intensify such fatal consequences and others, including crop loss to drought, spread of disease, and loss of imperiled plants and animals.
These consequences are exactly what world leaders gathered in Belem, Brazil, for COP30 are trying to prevent, by limiting global heating by every fraction of a degree that they can. That goal can’t be achieved without serious guardrails on AI data center development.
It’s critical that AI become part of global climate negotiations—not as an escape hatch for how it could save the planet, but as an urgent threat to people, wildlife, and the atmosphere.
Before AI unleashes a fresh hell of global heating, countries should commit to zeroing out the emissions from data centers by using renewable energy and storage.
From Virginia to Tucson to Kosciuko County, Indiana, communities around the country have sprouted near-overnight campaigns to protect their water and electricity from being consumed by data centers and to prevent rate hikes to subsidize two of the wealthiest industries on Earth.
Besides playing defense, now is the time to be proactive and question whether data centers serve the public interest despite their many harms. If local communities still think so, they can pass strict regulations to ensure that data centers are powered fully by on-site renewable energy and batteries. If more power is needed, Big Tech companies can pay for residences to get rooftop solar and storage, heat pumps, and energy efficient appliances to free up capacity on the grid for data center neighbors.
Amid all the hype and seeming inevitability of AI dominance, human beings have a chance now to proactively consider what relationship we want with this technology—and the environmental price we’re willing to pay.
The COP30 climate talks will be a starting place for the world to look carefully at AI’s climate consequences. The tsunami of AI hype and the Trump destruction machine make for daunting foes. But they don’t have to wash away our resolve to leave this world better than we found it.
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It’s 2025. The AI Revolution Is Destroying the American Dream
The rise of AI will exacerbate income inequality throughout the country, and it’s the government’s duty to step up and take care of its citizens when required.
Nov 07, 2025
In 2019, the New York Times published a series of op-ed columns “from the future,” including one from 2043 urging policymakers to rethink what the American Dream looks like amid an AI revolution.
Well, it’s only 2025, and the American Dream is already in jeopardy of dying because of AI’s impact.
Earlier this year, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei warned of a “white-collar bloodbath,” which was met with criticism by some of his tech colleagues and competitors. However, we’re already seeing a “bloodbath” come to pass. Amazon is preparing to lay off as many as 30,000 corporate employees, with its senior vice president stating that AI is “enabling companies to innovate much faster.” As it (unsurprisingly) turns out, CEOs across industries share this same sentiment.
We’re seeing the most visible signs of this “bloodbath” at the entry level. Recent graduates are having difficulty finding work in their fields and are taking part-time roles in fast food and retail in order to make ends meet. After being told for years that going to college was the key to being successful, up-and-coming generations are being met with disillusionment.
If Americans can’t reach a decent standard of living now, they’ll be worse off as the AI revolution marches forward.
Despite dire statistics and repeated warnings from researchers and economists alike, people at the decision-making table aren’t listening. White House AI czar David Sacks brushed off fears of mass job displacement this past summer, and adviser Jacob Helberg dismissed the idea that the government has to “hold the hands of every single person getting displaced” by AI.
Unlike the hypothetical 2043, there aren’t people marching in the streets demanding that the government guarantee they’ll still have livelihoods when AI takes their jobs—yet. However, this prediction could easily come true. Life is already unaffordable for the majority of Americans. Add Big Tech’s hoarding of the wealth being created by AI and inconsistent job opportunities, and we could have class warfare on our hands.
OpenAI’s Sam Altman perfectly encapsulated the ignorance of Silicon Valley when he implied that if jobs are replaced by AI, they aren’t “real work.” It’s no surprise that Altman, who has profit margins reaching the billions, doesn’t understand that jobs aren’t just jobs to middle-class families; they are ways for Americans to build their livelihoods, and ultimately, find purpose. Our country—for better or for worse—was built on the idea that anyone could keep their head down, work hard, and achieve the American Dream. If that’s no longer the case, then we must rethink the American Dream itself.
We can’t close the Pandora’s box of AI, nor should we. Advanced AI will bring about positive, transformative change in society if we utilize it correctly. But our policymakers must start taking AI’s impact on our workforce seriously.
That’s not to say there aren’t influential leaders already speaking out. In fact, concerns about AI’s effects on American workers span party lines. Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy wrote a compelling essay arguing in part that there won’t be enough jobs created by advanced AI to replace the lost jobs. Republican Sen. Josh Hawley is pushing the Republican Party to make AI a priority in order to be “a party of working people.” Independent Sen.Bernie Sanders released a report revealing that as many as 100 million jobs could be displaced to AI and proposed a “robot tax” to mitigate the technology’s effects on the labor force—another version of universal basic income (UBI).
Now, I won’t pretend to know the best policy solution that will allow Americans to continue flourishing in the AI era. However, I do know that the rise of AI will exacerbate income inequality throughout the country and that it’s the government’s duty to step up and take care of its citizens when required.
This starts by looking at how we can rebuild our social safety net in an era where Americans do less or go without work altogether. For millions of Americans, healthcare coverage is tied to their employment, as are Social Security benefits. If Americans aren’t employed, then they can’t contribute to their future checks when they’re retired. This leads to questions about the concept of retirement. Will it even exist in the future? Will Americans even be able to find happiness in forced “retirement” without an income and without the purpose provided by work?
It’s easy to spiral here, but you get the point. This is a complicated issue with consequences that we’ll be reckoning with for years to come. But we don’t have that kind of time. If Americans can’t reach a decent standard of living now, they’ll be worse off as the AI revolution marches forward.
It’s 2025, and AI is already transforming the world as we know it. In this economy, we must create a new American Dream that allows Americans to pursue life, liberty, and happiness on their own terms.
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Warning Against Taxpayer Bailout for Big Tech, Critics Fume Over OpenAI Execs' Talk of Government Loans
"Big Tech is building a mountain of speculative infrastructure," warned one critic. "Now it wants the US government to prop up the bubble before it bursts."
Nov 06, 2025
Tech giant OpenAI generated significant backlash this week after one of its top executives floated potential loan guarantees from the US government to help fund its massive infrastructure buildout.
In a Wednesday interview with The Wall Street Journal, OpenAI chief financial officer Sarah Friar suggested that the federal government could get involved in infrastructure development for artificial intelligence by offering a "guarantee," which she said could "drop the cost of the financing" and increase the amount of debt her firm could take on.
When asked if she was specifically talking about a "federal backstop for chip investment," she replied, "Exactly."
Hours after the interview, Friar walked back her remarks and insisted that "OpenAI is not seeking a government backstop for our infrastructure commitments," while adding that she was "making the point that American strength in technology will come from building real industrial capacity, which requires the private sector and government playing their part."
Despite Friar's walk-back, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said during a podcast interview with economist Tyler Cowen that released on Thursday that he believed the government ultimately could be a backstop to the artificial intelligence industry.
"When something gets sufficiently huge... the federal government is kind of the insurer of last resort, as we've seen in various financial crises," he said. "Given the magnitude of what I expect AI's economic impact to look like, I do think the government ends up as the insurer of last resort."
Friar and Altman's remarks about government backstops for OpenAI loans drew the immediate ire of Robert Weissman, co-president of consumer advocacy organization Public Citizen, who expressed concerns that the tech industry may have already opened up talks about loan guarantees with President Donald Trump's administration.
"Given the Trump regime’s eagerness to shower taxpayer subsidies and benefits on favored corporations, it is entirely possible that OpenAI and the White House are concocting a scheme to siphon taxpayer money into OpenAI’s coffers, perhaps with some tribute paid to Trump and his family." Weissman said. "Perhaps not so coincidentally, OpenAI President Greg Brockman was among the attendees at a dinner for donors to Trump’s White House ballroom, though neither he nor OpenAI have been reported to be actual donors."
JB Branch, Public Citizen’s Big Tech accountability advocate, said even suggesting government backstops for OpenAI showed that the company and its executives were "completely out of touch with reality," and he argued it was no coincidence that Friar floated the possibility of federal loan guarantees at a time when many analysts have been questioning whether the AI industry is an unsustainable financial bubble.
"The truth is simple: the AI bubble is swelling, and OpenAI knows it," he said. "Big Tech is building a mountain of speculative infrastructure without real-world demands or proven productivity-enhancing use cases to justify it. Now it wants the US government to prop up the bubble before it bursts. This is an escape plan for an industry that has overpromised and underdelivered."
An MIT Media Lab report found in September that while AI use has doubled in workplaces since 2023, 95% of organizations that have invested in the technology have seen "no measurable return on their investment."
Concerns about an AI bubble intensified earlier this week when investor Michael Burry, who famously made a fortune by short-selling the US housing market ahead of the 2008 financial crisis, revealed that his firm was making bets against Nvidia and Palantir, two of the biggest players in the AI industry.
This has led to some AI industry players to complain that markets and governments are undervaluing their products.
During her Wednesday WSJ interview, for instance, Friar complained that "I don’t think there’s enough exuberance about AI, when I think about the actual practical implications and what it can do for individual."
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, meanwhile, told the Financial Times that China was going to beat the US in the race to develop high-powered artificial intelligence because the Chinese government offers more energy subsidies to AI and doesn't put as much regulation on AI development.
Huang also complained that "we need more optimism" about the AI industry in the US.
Investment researcher Ross Hendricks, however, dismissed Huang's warning about China winning the AI battle, and he accused the Nvidia CEO of seeking special government favors.
"This is nothing more than Jensen Huang foaming the runway for a federal AI bailout in coordination with OpenAI's latest plea in the WSJ," he commented in a post on X. "These grifters simply can't be happy making billions from one of the greatest investment manias of all time. They'll do everything possible to loot taxpayers to prevent it from popping."
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