A recent paper by MIT researchers predicts that by 2050, the energy consumption and emissions of autonomous vehicles (AVs) will be comparable to that of data centers today, which is 1 percent of global energy consumption and 0.3 percent of global emissions.
In order to reduce the future carbon footprint of AVs, scientists will need to make the computing systems of AVs, including smart sensors, far more efficient.
he growing visibility of climate disasters around the world, such as flooding and wildfires, have made it impossible to ignore the impact that daily luxuries, such as plastic waste, have on our planet. Yet despite progress towards tackling climate change’s most conspicuous culprits, another prominent source may soon be lurking under our noses—or right in our hands.
Whether we’re saving family photos or Googling pictures of suspicious rashes on WebMD, our devices are using energy to reach into “the cloud” and pull out our tiniest whims. The cost of maintaining the data center brain behind all this knowledge—such as keeping the computers from overheating in addition to simply powering them—is a whopping 1 percent of global electricity consumption, which generates 0.3 percent of global emissions, according to a 2022 report from the International Energy Agency.
Other invisible sources like digital currencies, including Bitcoin, have made headlines for eating up large chunks of energy, but a paper published by MIT researchers at the end of last year suggests that a new source of digital emissions could emerge by 2050 to rival data-center emissions: autonomous vehicles (AVs).
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