09 July 2025

AI : “We need ecological planning for digital technology over 5, 10, and 25 years.”

[Translation of the op-ed published on July 9, 2025, in Les Echos: IA : « Il faut une planification écologique du numérique à cinq, dix et vingt-cinq ans » | Les Echos]

The energy-hungry US approach to AI is not the only possible path, argue Jean-Marc Jancovici and Hugues Ferreboeuf from The Shift Project. Europe must implement a distinctive strategy—one that aligns with its values and respects planetary boundaries.

The pace of development in the AI industry and its applications is so frantic that its harmful environmental and energy consequences are now undeniable. Yet they remain underestimated and are often portrayed as incidental.

The current AI phenomenon is unfolding on top of a highly inflationary digital dynamic over the past decade or so. The carbon footprint – 4% of global greenhouse gas emissions – and energy footprint – 11% of electricity consumption – of digital technology have grown by around 5% per year, despite major gains in energy efficiency. This is largely due to the rise of increasingly intensive digital services, driven by the extractive business models of ultra-dominant players—the Big Tech companies.

The AI phenomenon cannot be reduced to its purely technological dimension: it also reflects the intensification of industrial and commercial strategies that serve the economic and cultural domination objectives of the United States.

Limited room for manoeuvre

The accelerated rollout driven by these strategies could lead to an unplanned tripling of electricity consumption by data centers in Europe over the next ten years (+200 TWh), further increasing not only our digital dependence but also our energy dependence—by extending reliance on LNG. This sharp rise in demand is already prompting the construction of new gas-fired power plants in the United States and coal-fired plants in China, undermining efforts to decarbonize the energy sector.

In France, today’s massive electricity exports mask the limited room for manoeuvre we will face tomorrow when confronted with a few dozen TWh that are not accounted for in current forecasts – as per the PPE [translator’s note: french multiannual energy programming].

At the local level, competing demands for electricity would emerge—a large data center requires as much power (1 GW) as a major industrial site—alongside increased pressure on water management.

Explosion of uses

Yet the energy-intensive approach to AI promoted by the American techno-industrial system is not the only possible path. This system is pushing for the widespread, default deployment of multimodal generative AI systems based on large language models—by nature energy-intensive due to their massive computing requirements.

However, use case analyses within companies often reveal far lower relevance than expected, falling short of that offered by more efficient, specialized generative AI—or even by “traditional” AI systems.

As for the general public, the conversational abilities and versatility of ChatGPT and its competitors—combined with free access—have triggered an explosion of all kinds of uses, with no sense of moderation. In fact, systematically turning to AI instead of a search engine for simple queries results in energy consumption ten times higher, without delivering more relevant answers. Users are largely unaware of this, due to the deliberate opacity maintained by service providers.

Ecological planning for digital technology

Europe’s technological future depends on its ability to design and implement a distinctive strategy—one that aligns with its values and respects planetary boundaries. This requires reversing the current dynamics rather than imitating the American approach—which leads to an ecological dead end—with fewer resources. Europe must craft a differentiated, resource-efficient AI strategy as part of a broader trajectory that sets clear limits on the resources digital technology can use. This strategy should prioritize sector-specific applications and software innovation over raw computing power.

Now more than ever, ecological planning for digital technology is essential—in France and across Europe. This means setting a clear electricity consumption cap for 5, 10, and 25 years. Such planning must be grounded in an informed public debate on the role of digital technology in society, including which uses are desirable not only from an environmental standpoint but also from an ethical one.

Jean-Marc Jancovici is President of The Shift Project.
Hugues Ferreboeuf is Digital Project Director at The Shift Project.

The Shift Project will publish its latest report on AI and data centers on October 1st, 2025.

Click here to register for the presentation at 6:30 pm (in person or online)