Sunday, December 21, 2025

ChatGPT’s Energy Consumption: Equivalent to Half of Denmark’s Yearly Electricity Use

A recent BestBrokers analysis reveals that ChatGPT’s annual electricity consumption for user prompts is approximately 17.23 terawatt-hours (TWh), comparable to the total electricity usage of Iceland and half of Denmark’s. With the introduction of GPT-5.2, this rise in AI sophistication has driven increased energy demands, with each query consuming about 18.9 watt-hours—over 50 times that of a standard Google search. ChatGPT, serving around 810 million active weekly users who submit an average of 22 questions, processes about 2.5 billion requests daily, leading to an estimated annual power cost of USD 2.42 billion. This energy could power New York City for 113 days or run the U.S. for 34 hours. Analyst Alan Goldberg emphasizes the growing energy gap, urging for improved transparency and optimization standards in AI energy consumption. The full report includes detailed calculations and insights on the environmental implications of AI’s rapid growth.

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