Gerry McGovern

Author of World Wide Waste. Developer of Top Tasks. Focused on reducing data waste and e-waste.

E-waste: Hold onto devices as long as possible.
Data waste: Reduce the quantity of data as much as possible
Sustainable digital design: Design as light as possible.
World Wide Waste: https://gerrymcgovern.com/books/world-wide-waste/

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gerrymcgovern_at_mastodon.green@momostr.pink

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Last Notes

2024-08-07 09:56:59

"Citizens in the global north must use less energy, with some studies putting the decrease at 68-86%. This is not the arbitrary demand of a privileged interest group. Rather, it is in the interest of environmental justice. Almost anything that could conceivably be valued -including democracy- is put at risk by environmental breakdown, so its causes must be eliminated for the common good."
https://www.resilience.org/stories/2024-08-06/degrowth-and-disagreement-why-engage-with-our-strongest-critics/
We must radically reduce energy consumption. There is no other way.

2024-08-07 05:40:02

"The potential of AI is humongous," says Publicis Groupe's Anupriya Acharya. "Advertising has always been about lying and misinformation and never before have we had as powerful a lying machine as AI. It's the Great Big Lying Machine. It's incredible, fantastic. Now, we can have an AI companion for every single consumer, lying and tricking and manipulating them at every step of the way. I can't tell you how excited we are about this in advertisingland. It's so cool."
https://www.storyboard18.com/advertising/ai-now-a-core-component-in-advertising-strategies-says-publicis-groupes-anupriya-acharya-38870.htm

2024-08-05 15:23:07

- reply

The USA sent Navajo men into the uranium mines. They didn't tell them how dangerous it was. When the men got sick, they were abandoned, given no help.
Wherever there is a story of mining, of oil, gas, coal, lithium, there is a story of evil. Now it's bitcoin and AI. How can a civilization hope to survive that does so much evil?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5z8OgMfXXc

2024-08-05 15:19:09

“We are facing a dangerous period ahead. If we do not stop, correct and change some of these wrongdoings now, we are all going to suffer. Either the thing that we make will overtake us or Nature will take over. Earthquake, flood, rain, severe drought, severe winter. Lightning destructive. Great wind destructive. These things will warn us that we are not following the law of the Great Spirit.”
Thomas Banyacya, Interpreter for Traditional Hopi leaders, 1985
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5z8OgMfXXc

2024-08-05 12:50:02

The roots of white supremacy
"Singer’s stance challenges human exceptionalism, the view that humans are greater in moral value than nonhuman beings simply by virtue of being human. Our species imagines itself occupying the top rung of a mythical scala naturae (‘great chain of being’) that places all other species on lower levels according to how similar they are to us."
https://aeon.co/essays/why-nonhuman-beings-should-be-granted-personhood-rights#Echobox=1663215230-2

2024-08-05 09:53:06

"Amazon Basin faces severe drought, impacting multiple countries and prompting emergency measures."
https://invezz.com/news/2024/08/04/is-a-water-crisis-imminent-amazon-drought-raises-alarms-over-water-levels-forest-fires-and-food-security/
Meanwhile, in environment destroyer Big Tech land ... those water guzzling data centers ...
"Over the next five years, Latin America will be the fastest-growing market in the world for data center development, with some predicting growth of 250% over that period."
https://www.sobencc.com/insights/latin-american-data-center-market/

2024-08-05 09:41:20

AI is a scam on our environment
"Besides requiring huge quantities of fresh water to keep data centres cool, when powered by non-renewable energy sources, artificial intelligence also releases significant amounts of carbon emissions. Each individual use of genAI to answer a question or produce an image comes at an incredible cost to the planet; with the technology spreading at unprecedented pace around the world, its environmental footprint is only destined to increase."
https://earth.org/generative-ai-is-exhausting-the-power-grid/

2024-08-04 14:28:18

SCAM ALERT: Data centers bring practically zero local jobs. They are a tax break scam everywhere they operate.
"Washington lawmakers approved a tax break for data centers to create more jobs in rural Washington, but they can’t say how many jobs the state actually got. Repeated expansions turned a modest program to bring a budding industry to rural areas into one of the biggest corporate tax giveaways in the state."
https://www.propublica.org/article/washington-data-centers-tech-jobs-tax-break

2024-08-03 15:53:49

Extinction Rebellion Ireland has warned that if a planned new Google Ireland data centre gets the planning go-ahead for south Dublin “it will be met with massive local and national pushback and action”.
“This expansion is a disaster for local communities, water shortages, transition to a more sustainable economy, and reaching our climate targets."
https://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/extinction-rebellion-ireland-warns-google-data-centre-will-be-met-with-massive-pushback-1657516.html
All over the world, communities are getting organized against data centers.

2024-08-03 11:35:42

• Billionaires belch and fart a million times more CO2 than normal people
• 125 ultra-wealthy individuals belch and fart more CO2 than 85 million
• Bill Gates belches and farts almost 7,500 tonnes of CO2 per year.
• 80 million belch and fart more CO2 than the poorest 5 billion people.
• Top 1% get about 40% of all new wealth created. Poorest 50% get 2%.
• USA with 5% of the world's population, has done 25% of the total environmental damage. It's the No 1 all-time greatest belcher and farter.

2024-08-03 10:29:42

AI costs more than $10,000 in recurring annual costs — per user.
Gartner "anticipates that businesses will abandon around 30% of their generative AI projects after reaching proof of concept by the end of 2025 due to poor data quality, suboptimal risk controls and, most importantly, hazy business value coupled with high costs."
Deploying: $5 million to $20 million
Building custom models: $20 million
Further customizing: $6.5 million
Embedding APIs into apps: $1 million
https://www.campaignlive.com/article/third-businesses-will-abandon-gen-ai-projects-2026-report-finds/1883000

2024-08-01 10:13:09

People: Help! Our home is on fire.
Tech bro: Here's a gallon of organic diesel.
People: What? That'll burn our home down even faster.
Tech bro: The burning of your home will help drive innovation in fire prevention technologies.
People: Our home will be burned at that stage.
Tech bro: Your home is immaterial. The innovation is required for the homes we will build on Mars.
People: But it's your home too!
Tech bro: ?

2024-07-31 12:21:09

- reply

It's the same in Ireland, where data centers are consuming 21% of electricity, more than all of urban Ireland. And the politicians are patting themselves on the back, hoping they can achieve 30% soon. All part of the strange world of happenings within a Growth Death Cult.

2024-07-31 08:50:04

"Many tech companies present a vision of their products as shining, autonomous machines — computers teaching themselves as they go from huge quantities of data — rather than the reality of the labor that trains them and is managed by them. The illusion of autonomous AI has historical roots. In the late 18th century, a supposedly automated chess-playing machine, the “Mechanical Turk,” was developed to impress the empress of Austria."
https://www.siliconvalley.com/2024/07/30/opinion-whats-behind-the-ai-boom-exploited-humans/amp/

2024-07-31 08:22:28

People: AI is destroying our environment.
Tech bro: This is an incredible opportunity for innovation in green tech energy!
People: There's no such thing as green tech energy. It all pollutes. It's just a matter of scale
Tech bro: The more energy and water AI consumes the greater the opportunities for tech innovation in energy and water conservation
People: You're not making any sense.
Tech bro: AI is the future. You can't stop progress. Innovation is key to everything.
People: Are you AI?

2024-07-30 12:21:16

The data center water wars are coming
"Potomac River flows, as measured at Point of Rocks, fell below 2,000 cubic feet per second on July 5. That was down nearly 1,000 cfs from a week earlier."
"Thank you, Loudoun County Board of Supervisors, keep approving the data centers who consume inordinate amounts of water for cooling and we won't have enough water."
https://www.loudounnow.com/news/cog-declares-regional-drought-watch/article_1da8541c-4ddb-11ef-b904-87cc8d943d35.html
Big Tech can only grow by devouring the environment. We are only at the beginning. AI has savage hungers.

2024-07-30 05:26:44

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"I always feared that the AI data center boom was likely going to make the looming climate catastrophe inevitable, but there was something about seeing it all presented on a platter with a smile and an excited presentation that struck me as more than just tone-deaf. It was damn near revolting."
"I'm going to give Huang and all the other tech CEOs the benefit of the doubt here and say that this isn't about pure greed at the end of the day."
It is. It's pure greed.
https://www.techradar.com/computing/i-watched-nvidias-computex-2024-keynote-and-it-made-my-blood-run-cold?campaign_id=54&emc=edit_clim_20240711&instance_id=128523&nl=climate-forward&regi_id=212319426&segment_id=171906&te=1&user_id=426099f95c578ed04d71fac12de20b00

2024-07-30 05:17:15

"Nvidia's Blackwell pulls down 15kW of power. That's 15,000 watts of power. Data center energy usage is already out of control, but Blackwell is going to pour jet fuel on it. Worse still, Huang said that in the future, he expects to see millions of these kinds of AI processors in use. One million Blackwell GPUs would suck down an astonishing 1.875 gigawatts of power. A typical nuclear power plant only produces 1 gigawatt of power."
https://www.techradar.com/computing/i-watched-nvidias-computex-2024-keynote-and-it-made-my-blood-run-cold?

2024-07-29 14:18:46

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This surge from AI, bitcoin and data in general is very real. Here's another story from today:
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/times-watchdog/power-hungry-how-the-data-center-boom-drained-wa-of-hydropower/
Also, in less than 10 years, data centers have moved from using 5% of Irish electricity to 21%
It's going to get a lot worse because of the exponential growth of data in multiple areas.
@npub1ucv…5a8g

2024-07-29 13:56:48

Will AI collapse the grid?
"Thanks to the artificial intelligence boom, new data centers are springing up as quickly as companies can build them. This has translated into huge demand for power to run and cool the servers inside. Now concerns are mounting about whether the U.S. can generate enough electricity for the widespread adoption of AI, and whether our aging grid will be able to handle the load."
https://www.nbcconnecticut.com/news/business/money-report/generative-ai-requires-massive-amounts-of-power-and-water-and-the-aging-u-s-grid-cant-handle-the-load/3346701/

2024-07-29 05:58:58

"The progressively powerful artificial intelligence (AI) models are becoming increasingly hungry for electrical power. The carbon footprint of generative AI, which includes models like Gemini and ChatGPT, is overwhelming. We should act now before it snowballs into another challenge to the planet's sustainability."
https://www.newsweek.com/will-ai-another-unsustainable-environmental-disaster-opinion-1928737
Big Tech is on a mission to destroy our environment. Why? Greed and power.

2024-07-29 05:44:47

"If AI were revolutionizing the economy, we would see it in the data. We're not seeing it. I could talk about the fact that AI companies have yet to find a killer app and that perhaps the biggest application of AI could be, like, scams, misinformation and threatening democracy. I could talk about the ungodly amount of electricity it takes to power AI and how it's raising serious concerns about its contribution to climate change."
https://www.npr.org/transcripts/1197967800

2024-07-28 17:37:57

In 1999, the UK Post Office introduced Horizon, a computer system developed by the Japanese company Fujitsu. Its purpose was to manage such tasks as accounting and stocktaking. Almost as soon as it was launched, the staff in the post offices began to complain that the system was full of errors. What would they know, though? They were just ordinary people in small towns and villages.
https://gerrymcgovern.com/the-ai-believers/

2024-07-24 14:41:19

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A much better thing would be if we had 90% less data centers, because the vast majority of the data we produce is crap. We don't need it. And CO2 is only one thing. Data centers are huge consumers of water, and have big impacts on mining and e-waste. This is classic Jevons Paradox too. Any efficiency is gobbled up by vastly more use.

2024-07-24 12:23:01

Data centers are now consuming 21% of Irish electricity. It's a staggering, crisis number.
What is the Irish government doing? Planning to double the number of data centers, so that they will be consuming 42% of Irish electricity.
Ireland is a Growth Death Cult. Ireland is bought, owned and sold by Big Tech. The Irish data center policy was written by Big Tech.
1261MW of Data Centers are currently operational
1286MW are planned
https://www.bitpower.ie/index.php/dashboard

2024-07-24 08:25:39

Indigenous peoples are one of the greatest sources of knowledge and wisdom when it comes to genuine sustainable living. They are under the most severe threat from our attempt to mine and manufacture and consume our way out of the problems we mined and manufactured and consumed our way into. The voices of the tech bro elite have been much too loud for much too long. We must center new voices, from the Indigenous, to the animals, to the birds and bees, to the rivers, oceans, soil, air and trees.

2024-07-23 10:19:51

‘Let’s not go overboard’ on worries about AI energy use, Bill Gates says. Microsoft co-founder argues Big Tech’s investment in power-hungry artificial intelligence systems is spurring a boom in clean electricity
https://www.ft.com/content/68495f0d-4d35-4270-a33d-02e9e537460f
Hi, Bill here. I'm going to break your knees. You should thank me because breaking your knees will help drive a boom in knee reconstruction surgery. (I'm breaking lots of other people's knees as well.)

2024-07-23 05:07:20

“Supplies of dissolved oxygen in bodies of water across the globe are dwindling rapidly, and scientists say it's one of the greatest risks to Earth's life support system.”
https://www.sciencealert.com/earths-water-is-rapidly-losing-oxygen-and-the-danger-is-huge
Scientists have discovered “dark oxygen” being produced in the deep ocean, by the very nodules of metals that mining companies want to dredge and collect, thus destroying entire ecosystems and vital oxygen supplies.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c728ven2v9eo

2024-07-20 15:38:31

"The drinking water used in data centers is often treated with chemicals to prevent corrosion and bacterial growth, rendering it unsuitable for human consumption or agricultural use. This means that not only are data centers consuming large quantities of drinking water, but they are also effectively removing it from the local water cycle."
https://utulsa.edu/news/data-centers-draining-resources-in-water-stressed-communities/

2024-07-20 12:28:17

Data center evaporative cooling systems are not simply ruinous to local water. It is also a contributor to global warming because evaporated water amplifies the greenhouse gas effect.
We are only beginning to understand the true and vast negative impact the greed of Big Tech is having on our environment. Meanwhile, Big Tech is so good at greenwashing and buying off politicians and media, it has been able to sell itself as a "green" savior.
https://science.nasa.gov/earth/climate-change/steamy-relationships-how-atmospheric-water-vapor-amplifies-earths-greenhouse-effect/

2024-07-20 11:03:59

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A single query to an AI-powered chatbot can use up to ten times as much energy as an old-fashioned Google search, while a generative AI system may use 33 times more energy to complete a task than it would take with traditional software.
https://theconversation.com/power-hungry-ai-is-driving-a-surge-in-tech-giant-carbon-emissions-nobody-knows-what-to-do-about-it-233452
@npub165c…tdlq

2024-07-20 11:00:31

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Hope this helps
For inference (i.e., conversation with ChatGPT), our estimate shows that ChatGPT needs a 500-ml bottle of water for a short conversation of roughly 20 to 50 questions and answers, depending on when and where the model is deployed.
https://themarkup.org/hello-world/2023/04/15/the-secret-water-footprint-of-ai-technology
ChatGPT may have consumed as much electricity as 175,000 people in January 2023.
https://towardsdatascience.com/chatgpts-electricity-consumption-7873483feac4
@npub165c…tdlq

2024-07-19 13:58:54

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Away from computer at moment but will get back to you
@npub10fw…2fd9

2024-07-19 12:50:06

Bitcoin is depraved and evil on so many levels
"Residents of the small town of Granbury, Texas, say bitcoin is more than just a figurative headache. Soon after a company opened up a bitcoin mine there a couple years ago, locals started experiencing excruciating migraines, hearing loss, nausea, panic attacks, and more. Several people even ended up in the emergency room. The culprit? Noise from the mine’s cooling fans."
https://www.sciencefriday.com/segments/bitcoin-mine-health-crisis-noise-pollution-texas/

2024-07-19 04:52:00

The Sámi are Europe’s only recognized Indigenous group, having hunted, fished and herded reindeer across Arctic Europe for millennia before the arrival of Christianity.
Today, the Sámi are fighting across their territories to resist mining, logging and energy projects that disrupt traditional activities.
https://news.mongabay.com/2024/07/how-europes-only-indigenous-group-is-inspiring-a-greener-christianity/

2024-07-17 09:29:36

Degrowth — The Retail Model the Planet Would Vote For
Degrowth is a term that refers to a political and economic business model focused on shrinking, rather than growing, economies. At its core, degrowth promotes scaling back our global consumption of the world’s dwindling resources to a more sustainable level in the face of the current climate-change crisis.
https://www.gartner.com/en/supply-chain/insights/power-of-the-profession-blog/degrowth-the-retail-model-the-planet-would-vote-for
Even Gartner is positive on Degrowth.
Degrowth is the only hope.

2024-07-17 05:08:47

Amazon deforestation reduced by up to 83% in areas protected by Indigenous Peoples, study says
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-024-02458-w

2024-07-17 04:53:50

"Deforestation at one of Indonesia's largest nickel processing hubs is threatening an Indigenous group that is among the country's last uncontacted tribes, rights groups allege. Nickel is a key component in the batteries of electric vehicles, and Indonesia is both the world's largest producer and home to the biggest known reserves globally."
https://www.voanews.com/a/nickel-hub-apocalyptic-for-uncontacted-indonesia-tribe-say-ngos/7699909.html
The cost of the "Green" Transition is the Genocide of the Indigenous. So has Global North always done.

2024-07-16 09:28:07

In 2023, Google and Microsoft each consumed 24 TWh of electricity, surpassing the consumption of over 100 nations, including places like Iceland, Ghana, and Tunisia, according to an analysis by Michael Thomas.
https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/google-and-microsoft-consume-more-power-than-some-countries#xenforo-comments-3849364

2024-07-15 15:27:58

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Google's use of public water is a trade secret
"The average Google data center uses 450,000 gallons of water a day. The data center in Berkeley County used four times that amount in 2022 — 1.8 million gallons a day, or about 662 million gallons that year. This was potable water supplied through Berkeley County Water and Sanitation.
Google has maintained that its groundwater use is a protected "trade secret." Conservationists and community members disagree."
https://www.postandcourier.com/rising-waters/google-water-cooling-data-center-servers/article_405cf9ee-e6c6-11ee-9616-bb4073594830.html

2024-07-15 15:22:57

"At the Berkeley County data center, Google uses a process called "evaporative cooling" to prevent the servers from overheating. As water lowers the temperature of the equipment, which can get very hot, it evaporates. The water leftover goes through the process again, each time a little less efficiently. Eventually, it all evaporates, leaving behind only dissolved solids, such as minerals, metals and salt, which is discharged as waste."
https://www.postandcourier.com/rising-waters/google-water-cooling-data-center-servers/article_405cf9ee-e6c6-11ee-9616-bb4073594830.html

2024-07-12 14:28:08

AI: Good news! I am now consuming a Sweden worth of RENEWABLE energy.
A little later
AI: Even better news! I am now consuming a Europe worth of RENEWABLE energy.
A little later.
AI: Fabulous news. I am now consuming an Earth's world of RENEWABLE energy. (Everything is dead)
A little later.
AI: You won't believe this!! I am now consuming 10 sun's worth of RENEWABLE energy.

2024-07-12 13:08:10

"The energy needs of AI are shifting the calculus of energy companies. They’re now exploring previously untenable options, such as restarting a nuclear reactor at the Three Mile Island power plant that has been dormant since the infamous disaster in 1979."
https://theconversation.com/ai-supercharges-data-center-energy-use-straining-the-grid-and-slowing-sustainability-efforts-232697
But, but, but weren't these data centers supposed to be so superbly efficient?
Ah, sorry, it's the same old story. Efficiency always leads to more total energy use, not less.
An efficient apocalypse.

2024-07-11 15:05:45

About as many countries opened new coal plant units as shut units down in 2023, but overall more capacity added than retired
A surge in new coal plants coming online in China drove this increase — 47.4 GW, or roughly two- thirds of global additions — coupled with new capacity in Indonesia, India, Vietnam, Japan, Bangladesh, Pakistan, South Korea, Greece, and Zimbabwe.
https://globalenergymonitor.org/report/boom-and-bust-coal-2024/

2024-07-09 15:56:56

"A generative AI system may use 33 times more energy to complete a task than it would take with traditional software. This enormous demand for energy translates into surges in carbon emissions and water use, and may place further stress on electricity grids already strained by climate change."
https://techxplore.com/news/2024-07-power-hungry-ai-surge-tech.html
For what? What do we get for this this unbelievable surge in energy consumption right at the moment we must reduce energy consumption.
AI is a scam of biblical proportions

2024-07-09 05:32:00

Content moderators and data annotators in African countries like Kenya and Uganda work long hours for low pay, often exposed to disturbing content.
These workers play a crucial role in training AI, but face poor working conditions and psychological stress.
Many workers are on short-term contracts with little job security.
The work is intensely monitored, with strict productivity targets and surveillance of workers’ activities.
https://blockonomi.com/african-workers-the-unseen-force-behind-ai-and-social-media-moderation/

2024-06-20 14:46:01

"Nvidia, the leader of the AI-chip revolution and a Wall Street darling, has over the past three years alone shipped some 5 million high-power AI chips. To put this in perspective, every such AI chip uses roughly as much electricity each year as do three electric vehicles."
https://www.city-journal.org/article/the-energy-transition-wont-happen

2024-06-20 14:36:20

There is no "Green" Transition
There is no Energy Transition
There is an Energy Addition
There is a Greed Transition
"Despite international agreements, government spending and regulations,
and technological advancements, global fossil fuel consumption surged by 55
percent between 1997 and 2023. And the share of fossil fuels in global energy
consumption has only decreased from nearly 86 percent in 1997 to approximately 82 percent in 2022."
https://www.fraserinstitute.org/sites/default/files/halfway-between-kyoto-and-2050.pdf

2024-06-19 06:52:46

Spurred by an increasing number of power-hungry data centers, the keepers of the electric grid in Northern Virginia are embarking on an ambitious, multi-billion-dollar plan to bring more electricity.
“This is impacting the entire region, and all because of Loudoun and Prince William counties approving data centers,” said Karen Sheehan, director of the Coalition to Protect Prince William County. She noted that ratepayers across the region will pay for the improvements.
https://protectpwc.org/2023/08/30/prince-william-times-data-center-driven-power-crunch-prompts-planning-for-new-high-voltage-lines/

2024-06-18 07:51:23

Australia: "Reclaim the Void, a project representing the sadness expressed by Ngalia Elders over the many open mining pits dotting their land, aims to create a significant textile artwork in the form of a 'dot', which will be installed on land affected by mining. The finished piece, inspired by a painting by the late Ngalia Elder and land custodian, DW, will tell the story of the country."
https://nit.com.au/17-06-2024/12012/reclaim-the-void-weaves-a-connection-for-spirits-on-sacred-lands

2024-06-17 06:56:35

"Just last week, we reported on an article in Wired that claims nearly half of all renewable energy is being used to power data centers. It isn’t powering schools or hospitals or disadvantaged neighborhoods. It is being used to make more money for Google, X, Amazon, and Facebook."
https://cleantechnica.com/2024/06/14/concerned-citizens-seek-transparency-about-data-centers-in-virginia/

2024-06-13 18:31:32

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• Richest 10% from USA produce more than double the CO2 of richest 10 percent in Europe and China
• United States only includes 5% of the world's population, while accounting for more than a quarter of climate change damage.
• USA is world’s No 1 all-time greatest polluterr and destroyer of environments.
• The average resident of Mali has the same carbon footprint as a British kettle
• Average resident of Nigeria has the same carbon footprint as a US fridge.

2024-06-13 18:30:43

• Billionaires are responsible for a million times more CO2 than normal person
• 125 ultra-wealthy individuals emit more CO2 than 85 million.
• Bill Gates belches almost 7,500 tonnes of CO2 per year.
• 80 million cause more CO2 than the poorest 5 billion people.
• The top 1% are responsible for more environmental damage than the poorest 50%
• Top 1% get about 40% of all new wealth created. Poorest 50% get 2%.

2024-06-13 12:45:52

"In 2018, one of Spain’s top-ranked universities, which trains its graduates for careers in everything from neuroscience and biomedicine to government and economics, launched a first-of-its-kind master’s program in a more nascent and explicitly nontraditional field: a degree in degrowth."
Degrowth calls for intentionally scaling down overdeveloped economies, focusing instead on citizens’ well-being, ecological sustainability, and providing for basic needs.
https://grist.org/looking-forward/what-can-you-do-with-a-degree-in-degrowth/

2024-06-11 10:24:12

"A company that adopts generative AI for something where they used to use more traditional optimization methods is probably using 10 to 20 times more carbon to do that, so if improvements aren't made, you're talking doubling or more in a five-year period in terms of the carbon footprint of the information technology that we do."
Big data centers that places like OpenAI are planning to build are gigawatt-scale data centers. That is as much energy as medium-sized cities.
https://www.caltech.edu/about/news/sustainable-computing-in-the-new-world-of-ai

2024-06-10 20:51:21

"A survey from Elon University shows 73% of American voters are “very” or “somewhat” concerned that artificial intelligence could influence the outcome of the presidential election, and 62% believe AI could be used to persuade people not to vote."
https://www.newsnationnow.com/business/tech/ai/voters-concerned-ai-influencing-election/

2024-06-10 20:45:38

Life: Our environment is dying. We're using energy and resources at a scale of 100. It should be a maximum of 20 to be sustainable.
Big Tech: We're only using 5 out of 100. We're not the problem. Don't focus on us.
Life: 5 out of 20 is a quarter. That's an awful lot. 20 must be our limit to survive.
Big Tech: We're just using 5 out of a 100. So not a lot. We're not the problem. Don't focus on us.
Life: We must slow down.
Big Tech: Keep on accelerating! Innovation! AI solves everything!

2024-06-08 14:07:18

"Who in the Nordic countries can have an interest in the destruction of Europe’s last wilderness area? Who can be willing to sacrifice the preconditions for the Indigenous people, the Sámi, to survive to the altar of economic growth and entertainment? What kind of conscience allows us to preach freedom and equality when we ignore the slow agony of an entire people at our doorstep, the far north of Europe?"
Kalervo Siikala, 1977

2024-06-07 21:00:48

"YouTube was again flooded with deep fake versions of Elon Musk on Thursday, with scammers hoping to dupe space lovers trying to catch the latest launch of SpaceX’s Starship rocket. Over 35 YouTube channels live-streamed an artificial intelligence-generated fake voice of Musk promising to return double the amount of crypto to those who deposited in the scheme, cybersecurity researchers at Avast Threat Labs said in a June 6 X post"
https://www.tradingview.com/news/cointelegraph:27784928f094b:0-over-35-fake-elon-musks-live-streamed-during-spacex-launch/

2024-06-06 12:36:59

E-waste colonialism: Israel dumps its e-waste in Palestine
"The rapid accumulation of electronic waste across the occupied Palestinian territory has prompted an investigation concerning its implications on the environment. This report will highlight the situation in Idhna, Deir Samit and Beit Awwa, three towns in Hebron that receive vast quantities of e-waste, most of which is transferred from Israel."
https://iep.berkeley.edu/content/case-study-hebron-palestine-environmental-and-health-impacts-electronic-waste-disposal
It's nothing but the same story all over the world.

2024-06-06 10:56:35

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I think you've summed it up well, grim as it is. And, to be honest, I can't see a way out. Our species so lacks wisdom, is so driven and controlled by a voracious elite. I intend to do as much possible to resist and warn, but there's too many trumps and musks in the world and too many mobs eager to follow them for the cheap promise of being special, and endless, easy convenience and consumption.
@npub1ptk…l68c @npub165c…tdlq @npub1wd3…fe2c

2024-06-05 13:08:03

"We have forecasted that power demand from data centers is going to nearly quadruple over the next 15 years. … The data centers are certainly the largest power users of any industry, and they represent about 20% of our electricity sales in Virginia.
Over the next 15 years we're going to be building a lot of new power plants in Virginia, and a lot of new electric transmission infrastructure."
https://www.wmra.org/2024-06-04/ghosts-in-the-machine-data-centers-in-our-region

2024-06-04 20:58:18

"Environmental activists took part in a rally in Reston to push for more state and local action to pause the out-of-control expansion of data centers. Organized by the Sierra Club to highlight “the harmful economic and environmental consequences of explosive data center growth.” That growth “poses serious threats to economic security, air and water quality, land use, and the state’s climate goals.” Data centers consume an enormous amount of electricity and water."
https://annandaletoday.com/climate-activists-speak-out-against-the-unchecked-growth-of-data-centers/

2024-06-02 17:49:57

As if Microsoft isn't doing enough damage to the environment, Windows 10 support ending could be an environmental disaster that puts 240 million PCs on the scrapheap
Microsoft needs to rethink Windows 10 support deadline, analyst firm warns
https://www.techradar.com/computing/windows/windows-10-support-ending-could-be-an-environmental-disaster-that-puts-240-million-pcs-on-the-scrapheap
How greedy can you get, Microsoft?

2024-05-31 12:07:32

Being lazy is good for the environment.
Not making a decision is good for the environment.
Doing literally nothing lets our planet breathe.
Our environment is so exhausted by all those hard workers
We need anti-consumers

2024-05-29 12:35:11

"While Big Tech wrings its hands about things like greenhouse gas emissions, IT teams out in the trenches aren't nearly as concerned about the eco-sustainability of their infrastructure. In fact, just 16.7 percent of the 2,869 IT professionals surveyed around the world this season by The Register considered sustainability a top issue, and only 38.7 percent considered it a priority at all."
https://www.theregister.com/2024/05/28/register_it_sustainability/
The tech industry is full of cynical greenwashers.

2024-05-29 12:14:15

Since 1970, there has been a:
49% decline in marine life
50% decline in insects
66% decline in wildlife
69% decline in vertebrates
83% decline in freshwater species
Birds: 60% decline in Ireland in 50 years
Lions: 90% decline in Ghana in 40 years
Forest elephant: 60% decline in 12 years
Leatherback turtle: 95% decline in 20 years
SEI whale: 50% decline in 20 years (47 left)
Earthworms: 33% decline in UK in 20 years
Mammals:
3% wildlife
97% humans and livestock
Is this progress?

2024-05-28 20:25:38

So, this guy takes out his new AI phone from Samsung and takes a photo of the table we're sitting at. Then he does some magic stuff with his AI and shows me the picture.
"Look," he says to me. "There are three glasses on the table and in the picture there are five. Isn't AI amazing!" And he laughed.
And all I could think was that this is happening in millions of places every minute of the day. All this energy. All this water. All these materials.
Destroying our environment for this?

2024-05-28 12:28:54

"The 404 Media website revealed on Thursday that Samsung requires independent repair shops to disclose customers’ names, contact information and complaints in case of repairs. In addition, repair shops must “immediately” notify Samsung if third-party components are found in the devices in question."
https://www.techadvisor.com/article/2346164/samsung-heavily-criticised-after-new-revelation.html

2024-05-22 12:20:14

Why are we giving the richest and most powerful companies in the world tax breaks, half-price water and half-price electricity? Why does Google, Facebook and Microsoft have to be on corporate welfare?
"Environmental groups warn that without ratepayer protections, average Michigan taxpayers may be burdened with hefty costs to support data centers, akin to supporting entire cities."
https://www.yahoo.com/news/environmental-groups-raise-concerns-data-164440393.html

2024-05-22 10:56:29

In the words of Ursula Le Guin “[the] power [of capitalism] seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings”.
"Growth and its attendant social structure has shaped the core of the modern Western subject, it has also become evident that a break away from this model will require not merely an economic shift, but the root-and-stem refashioning of our very selves—our practices, common senses, needs and values.
https://www.resilience.org/stories/2024-05-21/life-after-growth-a-peek-into-values-needs-and-time-for-degrowth/
Leave the Growth Death Cult
Degrowth is the only hope

2024-05-22 10:26:51

"The world’s data centres are using ever more electricity. In 2022, they gobbled up 460 terawatt hours of electricity, and the International Energy Agency (IEA) expects this to double in just four years. Data centres could be using a total of 1,000 terawatts hours annually by 2026. “This demand is roughly equivalent to the electricity consumption of Japan,” says the IEA. Japan has a population of 125 million people."
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cj5ll89dy2mo

2024-05-21 17:35:32

Since 1970, there has been a:
49% decline in marine life
50% decline in insects
63% decline in Irish birds
66% decline in wildlife
69% decline in vertebrates
83% decline in freshwater species
Dams and mining key cause of freshwater fish collapse.
Dams?
Is that where we get our sustainable, clean, green energy from?
Mining?
Don't we have to mine those green metals?
The Green Transition: killing everything on earth so humans can keep consuming, sorry, devouring
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/may/21/living-planet-index-migratory-freshwater-fish-populations-decline-dams-weirs-mining-water-abstraction-pollution-threat-aoe

2024-05-20 12:20:25

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Absolutely. We must build resilience at a local level. Also, shift culture from individual obsession to community fulfillment.
Finance is obsessed with energy transition because that's where it can make the next quick buck. It has nothing to do with saving environment.
@npub1a6c…mqgc @npub1cnc…jqe5

2024-05-20 10:40:49

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That makes an awful lot of sense to me. The only place I can see positive change coming from is from the community up.
We have to change the conversation from growth is good to don't be a member of the Growth Death Cult.
@npub1cnc…jqe5

2024-05-19 19:57:59

"Degrowth calls for an organized slowing down of society, to minimize harm to humans and other species. Degrowth and post-growth proponents conceive economic growth as a major driver of environmental degradation. Beyond a certain scale, the economy is seen to enter into conflict with ecological life-support systems, the costs of growth accelerate, and environmental conflicts multiply."
https://www.cell.com/one-earth/fulltext/S2590-3322(24)00146-5?_returnURL=https%3A%2F%2Flinkinghub.elsevier.com%2Fretrieve%2Fpii%2FS2590332224001465%3Fshowall%3Dtrue

2024-05-17 12:47:59

"Use of petroleum-based chemicals skyrocketed during the postwar era, most of them entering the market with little concern for safety. Now, mounting evidence links petrochemicals to the rapidly rising prevalence of a slew of chronic and deadly conditions, a review published in the New England Journal of Medicine warned earlier this month."
https://insideclimatenews.org/news/18032024/fossil-fuels-toxic-chemicals-deadly-diseases/

2024-05-17 10:57:12

What good is AI if you don't have a planet to use it on?
Microsoft released its 2024 Sustainability Report on Wednesday, and it's mostly bad news. Last year, Microsoft's emissions went up 29%, and it used 23% more water, primarily due to "new technologies, including generative AI."
https://au.pcmag.com/news/105283/microsofts-emissions-spike-29-as-ai-gobbles-up-resources
The Great Lying Machine is eating our environment and spewing out toxic misinformation. Big Tech has become a clear and present danger to all our futures.

2024-05-15 20:05:24

Microsoft's jaw-dropping nauseous greenwashing
Microsoft’s AI Push Imperils Climate Goal as Carbon Emissions Jump 30%
The company’s goal to be carbon negative by 2030 is harder to reach, but President Brad Smith says the good AI can do for the world will outweigh its environmental impact.
https://revealnews.org/article/what-california-can-learn-from-saudi-arabias-water-mystery/
Ah, Brad, Brad, pull the other one, fella. Maybe for once in your life could you be honest? It's the good AI will do your stock price. That's all you care about.

2024-05-15 10:49:57

"While many of the AI CEOs in Silicon Valley focus their attention on far-off existential catastrophes, researchers and technologists—especially women of color—have been calling attention to the discriminatory harms AI is already causing today. Yet the AI industry continues to ignore these immediate liabilities in favor of a theoretical future and engages in blatant greenwashing, redirecting concern by highlighting the supposed climate benefits of the technology."
https://foe.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/AI_Climate_Disinfo_v6_031224.pdf

2024-05-14 14:25:34

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Yeah, you're right. But we must move the conversation to a matrix of metrics. Because, right now, there's a lot of dishonest characters using CO2 supposed reduction, to drive all sorts of hidden agendas that do deep damage to environment. It comes back to Growth Death Cult. Some people will use any argument to justify powering ahead with growth.
@npub165c…tdlq

2024-05-14 13:36:06

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Fantastic image. Agree 100%. Overconsumption is meta crisis.
CO2 is the new "plastics recycling". Doesn't really happen but is a great "branding" story to divert attention from the real problem: That since 1970, we moved from being consumers of our environment to devourers.
It's not an energy production problem.
It's an energy consumption problem.
We use vastly too much energy and materials. We must slow down.
More tech won't save us.
Degrowth is the only hope.

2024-05-14 13:21:51

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“We don’t know how much water data centers use. We just know it’s a lot.”
https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/analysis/data-center-water-usage-remains-hidden/
“Water consumption in data centers is super embarrassing. It just doesn’t feel responsible.”
https://watercalculator.org/footprint/data-centers-water-use/
When it comes to water use, "the reason there's not a lot of transparency, simply put, I think most companies don't have a good story here.”
https://www.npr.org/2022/08/30/1119938708/data-centers-backbone-of-the-digital-economy-face-water-scarcity-and-climate-ris

2024-05-14 13:21:18

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There is an “atmosphere of secrecy that has been around water use in the industry.”
https://www.marketplace.org/shows/marketplace-tech/the-clouds-heavy-toll-on-natural-resources/
“I never thought it could be worse transparency than on the energy side, but we actually know less.”
https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/analysis/data-center-water-usage-remains-hidden/
“We have been really bad at reporting data centres accurately, largely because the data centres refuse to be transparent.”
Philip Boucher-Hayes, RTE

2024-05-14 10:32:03

Why has water become such an issue for AI and data centers?
Because for years, Big Tech boosted energy efficiency and reduced CO2 by using more and more water.
It also "reduced" CO2 by causing a massive increases in e-waste.
There is the huge danger in focusing only on CO2. To reduce CO2, we often degrade other life systems such as water, soil, biodiversity.
CO2 is increasingly being used for greenwashing.
We must measure the total cost to the environment, not just part of the cost.

2024-05-13 18:54:06

“They almost annihilated us, and that genocide continues. To destroy the environment you have to destroy the people who protect it.”
Juan Benito Mancias, Indigenous Texan
All over the world, right this very moment, industrial civilization is coming for the last of the Indigenous. They are seeking to finish the job their colonial ancestors started, often under the banner of the Green Transition, of clean, green and renewable energy. It is a twin attack.

2024-05-13 17:41:29

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We are in the beginning of a global environmental collapse driven by the massive overconsumption of energy and materials causing the degradation of water, soil, air, biodiversity, and along comes AI with massive new energy and material demands. That's the so what. We're devouring our environment. To have any hope of avoiding catastrophic environmental collapse, we must massively reduce our energy and materials consumption. We must prioritize things that are truly useful.

2024-05-13 14:52:40

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In our twisted economic dystopia, that which matters most is valued least. Big Tech eats cheap materials. Cheap land. Cheap water. Cheap energy. Cheap for Big Tech means the environment is paying heavy costs. In the Arizona desert, suffering from historic droughts, there is a race to build data centers and chip fabs. Why? Because the land is cheap, the electricity is cheap, and underneath there is water that has built up its reserves over much time. This reservoir is being sucked dry.

2024-05-13 14:12:40

Since 1970, humans have pumped so much groundwater, we’ve altered the Earth’s tilt. “It is, in a way, mind boggling,” the researchers who discovered the tilt, stated. Humans are causing so much polar ice to melt that we are changing time. We are slowing the Earth’s rotation and may have to subtract a leap second very soon.
https://www.science.org/content/article/humanity-s-groundwater-pumping-has-altered-earth-s-tilt
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/global-warming-is-slowing-the-earths-rotation/

2024-05-13 12:20:42

"ChatGPT consumes a lot of energy in the process, up to 25 times more than a Google search. Additionally, a lot of water is also used in cooling for the servers that run all that software. Per conversation of about 20 to 50 queries, half a litre of water evaporates – a small bottle, in other words."
AI is predicted to consume twice as much energy as the whole of France by 2030
Training GPT3, took 1,287 MWh (Megawatt hours) of electricity.
https://www.brusselstimes.com/world-all-news/1042696/chatgpt-consumes-25-times-more-energy-than-google

2024-05-13 11:59:28

"The British Crown and other colonial states relied on racist concepts like the Doctrine of Discovery and Terra Nullius, known as the unowned lands doctrine, to seize Indigenous lands and ignore or subvert the laws and institutions through which Indigenous Peoples had successfully managed these territories. The consequence has been cultural loss, alienation, impoverishment, conflict and environmental degradation."
https://theconversation.com/historic-haida-nation-agreement-shows-the-world-how-to-uphold-indigenous-rights-229447

2024-05-11 13:24:32

"By now it’s been made fairly clear that the bedazzling wonderment that is “AI” doesn’t come cheap. Story after story have highlighted how the technology consumes massive amounts of electricity and water, and we’re not really adapting to keep pace. This is also occurring alongside a destabilizing climate crisis that’s already putting a capacity and financial strain on aging electrical infrastructure."
https://www.techdirt.com/2024/05/10/ceo-ai-power-drain-could-cause-data-centers-to-run-out-of-power-within-two-years/

2024-05-08 12:00:23

"Degrowth, on the other hand, must keep an eye on the hands of the clock. For now, it is a collection of untested ideas but it cannot continue to be a cloistered wing of academia. Urgency drives the world view of degrowth. Transcendentalists saw anti-materialism as a necessary tool to achieve personal enlightenment – we now view simple living in the context of climate anxiety. Simple living can no longer be merely a matter of personal choice."
https://www.resilience.org/stories/2024-05-07/is-degrowth-an-academic-field-or-a-mass-movement-taking-degrowth-to-the-people/

2024-05-07 16:30:06

Junkyard computing
For specific workloads, clusters of repurposed phones are cheaper and more carbon efficient than traditional servers.
More broadly, scavenging unwanted equipment shows excellent potential for building economic and carbon-efficient
systems, especially when renewable energy is plentiful.
Junkyard Computing: Repurposing Discarded Smartphones to Minimize Carbon, Jennifer Switzer, Gabriel Marcano, Ryan Kastner, Pat Pannuto, ACM, 2023
https://dl.acm.org/doi/pdf/10.1145/3575693.3575710

2024-05-07 13:15:13

"Google is one of the largest and most profitable multinational corporations in the world. It wants to draw perhaps up to a million gallons of water daily from our city to cool their behemoth complex. I say perhaps because we don’t really know because they haven’t made public their plans. And they want to do this during a historic drought. A drought over three and a half years old which the Department of Natural Resources has labeled the longest in Iowa since the 1950s."
https://www.thegazette.com/letters-to-the-editor/first-google-wanted-a-tax-break-now-they-want-our-water/

2024-05-03 20:22:12

Child: "Daddy, how are we going to save our environment? To protect the water, air, soil, the birds and the bees and the butterflies?"
Father: "Through mining, sweetheart."
Child: "Through mining, Daddy?"
Father: "Mining is the new green. Mining is the path to sustainability. When you get older, darling, you'll understand. Now, go to sleep and have beautiful dreams of the wonderful future we adults are preparing for you."
Child: "Ok, Daddy. Love you."

2024-05-02 09:55:21

""It has happened," wrote developer Arian van Putten in a social media post over the weekend. "The number one Google result was an official Pulumi documentation page that was clearly written by an LLM (it had a disclaimer that it was) and hallucinated an AWS feature that didn't exist. This is the beginning of the end.""
"Search quality has declined because search engines index low-quality AI-generated content and present it in search results."
https://www.theregister.com/2024/05/01/pulumi_ai_pollution_of_search/

2024-05-01 13:19:26

Accused: "Your honor, it would be impossible for me the live at the standard I have become accustomed to were I not to rob banks."
Judge: "That sounds like a reasonable defense."
“It would be impossible to train today’s leading AI models without using copyrighted materials.”
OpenAI
What we criminalize in individual behavior, we call "innovation" when it comes to Big Tech. The whole system is bought and owned by Big Tech.

2024-04-29 16:26:08

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Smartphones could last 5-times longer “if the software was written using an efficient language.” Programmers have “no incentive to improve their software.”
https://semiengineering.com/a-highly-wasteful-industry/
It’s much, much worse. Bloat and waste IS the product. The more bloat and waste, the more people are forced to upgrade. Programmers are thus highly incentivized to create the most bloatware possible. The tech industry thrives by killing the environment.

2024-04-29 16:19:58

"The systems industry as a whole is not concerned about power. I know that is a bold statement, but I believe it to be true. The semiconductor industry is mildly concerned, but only indirectly. They care about power because thermal issues are limiting the functionality they can squeeze onto a chip, or in a package."
https://semiengineering.com/a-highly-wasteful-industry/
The tech industry has a deep culture of absolute contempt for energy and materials, and thus a contempt for the environment.