Utilities in the developed world are stressing over how to keep up with demand from data centres and artificial intelligence searches. But globally, keeping people cool is likely to be a much bigger drain on electricity grids and a more pressing power sector challenge.
Worldwide, data centres and air conditioners are both projected to triple their electricity use over the coming decade, and will severely test utilities that are already under strain from aging grids and lengthy backlogs for new supply.
Indeed, electricity demand from data centres is projected to rise by roughly 800 terawatt hours (TWh) by 2035, from around 416 TWh in 2024, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA).
That is enough to power around 75 million American homes for a year, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA).
Global demand for cooling systems, however, is set to rise by around 1,200 TWh by 2035, or nearly as much electricity as the entire Middle East consumes annually, data from think thank Ember shows.
Most data centre expansions are set to be within developed economies with modern power networks, and increased demand will primarily come from processing search requests for businesses and social media applications.
In contrast, the vast majority of the demand growth for air conditioning is set to occur in emerging economies where many communities already face the prospect of heat-related deaths and illness within already fragile energy systems.
Increased deaths and human suffering, the likely outcome of power system shortfalls in the developing world, are of a different order of magnitude than the risk of slower search results and economic drag that could result from failure to boost power supplies for data hubs.
Climate change is leading to more frequent, more intense and more prolonged heatwaves across the world, but especially in developing regions such as South and Southeast Asia where high humidity levels can amplify the impact of heat stress.
“A single heatwave – even one lasting just a few days – causes tens of thousands of excess deaths in India,” according to a report published in April by India’s Centre for Science and the Environment.
To combat the effects, new homes and offices across warm climate countries are scaling up the number of cooling units they contain.
And many of these areas are already undergoing a building boom, magnifying the amount of space needing to be cooled.
Yet another reason to work for radical equality as we restore/create massive aid programs to build heat pump factories in developing countries and buy one for every family who can’t afford it.
An interim solution is similar to what they’re doing in New Orleans: Set up cooling centers for people to turn to in case of blackouts, using a combination of solar panels and fueled generators.