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How AI could help – or hurt – Asia’s energy future

The tech’s climate footprint depends on whether the carbon emitted to run it exceeds the carbon it helps avoid

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    • An immersion cooling system for a data centre. In Asia, AI-powered irrigation systems are improving water efficiency and forecasting droughts and flooding.
    • An immersion cooling system for a data centre. In Asia, AI-powered irrigation systems are improving water efficiency and forecasting droughts and flooding. PHOTO: BT FILE

    Woochong Um

    Published Thu, Sep 17, 2026 · 07:00 AM

    ARTIFICIAL intelligence is one of the world’s fastest-growing sources of demand for electricity.

    Between 2025 and 2030, data centres for AI are projected to double their share of global electricity consumption to around 3 per cent. That is a 30-fold increase since the start of the decade.

    Currently, nearly two-thirds of the power that feeds AI comes from fossil fuels. Left unchecked, AI’s growth will lock in a new wave of carbon-emitting energy systems at exactly the moment when climate change and the global fuel crisis point to the urgent need to phase them out.

    Artificial IntelligenceEnergy transitionData centresCarbonGreen energy

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