AI's power play, and its impact on our world

If you’re unfortunate enough to spend as much time on LinkedIn as I do, you’ll have seen a lot of posts about the current capabilities of AI.

Whether it’s the AI Coke ad of last year or the current mashups of Interstellar and Studio Ghibli, there’s always someone (I suspect they are mainly plants, or bots from the AI companies) who can’t contain their excitement at what AI can do for $500 or thereabouts. 

These funny little videos of a cartoon version of Matthew McConaughey use up a quite terrifying amount of the planet’s resources. 

Invariably, that’s my cue to make a comment explaining that the true cost is actually the original source material the AI used, plus that $500, making the final result more expensive than Interstellar, but one millionth as good. 

Above: AI mashups of Interstellar and Studio Ghibli don't just cost $500, as some on LinkedIn say.

But the other point I have to make time and time again is that these funny little videos of a cartoon version of Matthew McConaughey use up a quite terrifying amount of the planet’s resources. Generating a single AI image uses up as much power as fully charging your phone, which means that 1,000 images suck up the same amount of carbon as driving a gasoline-powered car over four miles. 

One minute of lo-res AI-generated video, plus attendant revisions, use the same amount of energy as driving an electric car from LA to New York and back.

If you’ve worked in any kind of ad agency over the last year, you’ll know just how many such images are created for the numerous decks we produce each day.

But what about film? Well, one minute of lo-res AI-generated video, plus attendant revisions to get the right shots, use the same amount of energy as driving an electric car from LA to New York and back. But, in hi-res (eg Sora), it’s more like six trips around the entire circumference of the planet, or powering over 1,000 US homes for a day. 

And that’s before we get into the building of data centres, the water used to cool them, and the mining of the minerals it takes to make them function. 

Above: Creating one minute of lo-res AI-generated video can use the same amount of energy as driving an electric car from LA to New York and back.

So, it’s a lot. Especially for something we clearly didn’t need before about November 2022, when Chat GPT first appeared. But that’s far from the worst of it. According to AdGreen’s 2023 annual report, the average commercial production used 6.2 tonnes of CO2, while productions with shoot days costing over £50k used 13.9 tonnes. 

Where does all that come from, you might ask? Well, there are many smaller factors, such as accommodation, catering and waste disposal, but by far the largest contributor to advertising production’s carbon footprint is air travel, which makes up a colossal 60.2% of all emissions. 

By far the largest contributor to advertising production’s carbon footprint is air travel, which makes up a colossal 60.2% of all emissions. 

If we didn’t fly so many people so very far (do we really need two ECDs, a CCO, three account people, a producer, various assistants and, of course, multiple clients on a shoot?) we could probably spend all day cranking out AI films to out hearts’ content. 

I’m kidding, of course. But that trip abroad has always been a tempting carrot for creatives, especially those who work in the colder, rainier parts of the world. (As the old joke goes, a copywriter is typing out a script that says ‘Open on a beach in Hawaii’. His art director looks over his shoulder and asks which brief it’s for. “I’m not sure yet,” the copywriter replies.)

Above: Advertising's biggest impact on the climate crisis comes from air travel. 

I get it. I’ve very much been there (‘there’ being everywhere from Cape Town to Tokyo), so I also get that it might feel annoying to turn the tap off now, but if we want to reverse the situation, we have to start somewhere. Then again, all of that sits within the operational side of advertising. There’s a more important element that’s rooted in the fact that our industry is one of massive global influence. 

Companies are always going to advertise, so if we can move the industry in a more positive direction from the inside, that can only help. 

Yes, we help the wheels of capitalism move faster, and with that acceleration comes an increased use of resources. But companies are always going to advertise, so if we can move the industry in a more positive direction from the inside, that can only help. 

For example, if you’ve ever made a punchline out of being vegan, or shown someone driving a petrol car, or talked about AI as if it’s a reasonable inevitability, you’ve been modelling problematic behaviour for your audiences. Normalising those things is giving tacit permission for millions of TV viewers and social media scrollers to do the same, and that only adds to the problem.