Google Agrees To Pause AI Workloads To Protect the Grid When Power Demand Spikes (theregister.com) 50
Google will pause non-essential AI workloads to protect power grids, the advertising giant announced on Monday. From a report: The web giant already does this sort of thing for non-essential workloads like processing YouTube vids, which it moves to datacenters where power is available rather than continuing to run them in places demand for energy strains the grid. Under an agreement with Indiana Michigan Power (I&M) and the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), Google will use the same techniques for AI workloads.
The announcement comes as states served by the power companies brace for a heat wave that will likely strain the grid as residents use air conditioners and increase demand for energy. Amid debate about datacenters' consumption of power and water, the last thing that the Chocolate Factory needs is folks blaming its AI Mode search function for a power outage when temperatures top 100F (37.7C). Under the agreement, if energy demand surges or there's a disruption in the grid due to extreme weather, I&M and TVA can now request that Google reduce its power use by rescheduling workloads or limiting non-urgent tasks until the issue is resolved.
The announcement comes as states served by the power companies brace for a heat wave that will likely strain the grid as residents use air conditioners and increase demand for energy. Amid debate about datacenters' consumption of power and water, the last thing that the Chocolate Factory needs is folks blaming its AI Mode search function for a power outage when temperatures top 100F (37.7C). Under the agreement, if energy demand surges or there's a disruption in the grid due to extreme weather, I&M and TVA can now request that Google reduce its power use by rescheduling workloads or limiting non-urgent tasks until the issue is resolved.
I wonder if they go something similar for botcoi9 (Score:1)
I believe bitcoin mining has dinner m some of these same problems?
Tangentially related, I can't really imagine living next to a data center is much better than this.
https://youtu.be/m7_WDzPyoqU?si=0DzL86tib_Sq8gz8
Anyone here live next to a datacenter?
Re: (Score:1)
Repasting the link with desktop slashdot.
I Live 500 Feet From A Bitcoin Mine. My Life Is Hell. [youtu.be]
Re: (Score:3)
Anyone here live next to a datacenter?
I used to once, briefly, while I was looking for a permanent place. Not exactly next to it, but about as close as the people in your video are to that bitcoin mining hell. It was absolutely inaudible. If it weren't, the authorities would have shut it down pretty quickly. Tennozu Isle.
So yeah, properly enforced appropriate regulations do suck - for the polluters. But getting to and maintaining the italicized part is a whole war in itself.
Re: (Score:2)
Anyone here live next to a datacenter?
Many people in Silicon Valley live very close to many data centers. The city of Santa Clara, where many tech companies are located or at least nearby, has its own electrical utility with rates that are significantly lower than PG&E. So, it's not a surprise that there are a lot of data centers in Santa Clara.
"will pause non-essential AI workloads" (Score:5, Insightful)
Please... Which "AI" workloads are "essential"?
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Calm down, Grok.
Re:"will pause non-essential AI workloads" (Score:4, Insightful)
Please... Which "AI" workloads are "essential"?
When looking at it from a food/clothing/shelter point of view, the entire social media company is non-essential. And it’s quite silly to use this kind of language to defend obscene power needs. I don’t need social media to ever be defined as some kind of “essential” service. Because once that shit happens, the actual basic needs of society become secondary. When Facebook police can respond faster than the actual police, there’s a serious fucking problem with priority.
Re: (Score:2)
Yep.
Re: (Score:2)
Bored people with no access to amazoflix+hulu's latest sharknado "the revenge of the nuclear fish" make babies !!!
so then you have the overpopulation problem, the fights for the resources, the wars, the over consumption of energy that is now on the 'essential' side of the definition..
So, well, who knows, media companies and video games companies might actually be saving the world somehow....
A.I. and bitcoins no way i won't bend the rules so far that those coul
Re: (Score:2)
Bored people ... make babies !!!
[citation needed]
whence does this gem come?
Re: (Score:2)
Those for customers who paid for a high-availability SLA, to Google would be liable in the event of outage.
This is really saying nothing here. Instead of crashing the grid and disrupting their whole service, they'll reduce power usage by stopping "free" and low-tier customer workloads in order to prioritize their paying customers. It's a no-brainer.
Obviously none of it is "essential," but in this context they mean "essential to Google making money."
Re: (Score:2)
Everything that needs to deliver in real-time. If the automatic translation of the press conference suddenly shuts down is bad. If the newest Youtube-Uploads become visible a bit later is no big problem. Watch some other video in the meantime.
Re: (Score:2)
Everything that needs to deliver in real-time. If the automatic translation of the press conference suddenly shuts down is bad. If the newest Youtube-Uploads become visible a bit later is no big problem. Watch some other video in the meantime.
Electricity needs to deliver in real-time. To everyone. All of the time. If power shuts down, it’s not just “bad”. It’s fucking deadly.
Hope that helps voters translate where a press conference should land in the big picture, as we discuss the definition of “essential” with a greedy mega-corp.
Your power bill is still going up (Score:4, Insightful)
We are already seeing people in California suggesting that people should have to take fewer showers to keep the AI data centers in water. There was a bunch of outrage when it was said but that's how that works. You introduced the idea into the public consciousness and then you continuously reintroduce it until it becomes normalized.
I've been watching megacorporations use that trick for 50 years and it always works because we never learn.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
"The only "True Americans" were here before 1492."
No, they were immigrants too.
Re: Your power bill is still going up (Score:2)
How come Washington state has so much extra capacity that it has to curtail hydropower production at night,and often curtails wind farms during the day due to excess supply?
What if your power bills are going up not because of an actual scarcity, but because regulators increase retsil rates even as utilities hedge their costs in financial markets su h that they don't even need retail income to sustain operations, that is just icing on the cake, handed them on a silver platter by scarcity mongers such as your
Re: (Score:3)
We are already seeing people in California suggesting that people should have to take fewer showers to keep the AI data centers in water. There was a bunch of outrage when it was said but that's how that works. You introduced the idea into the public consciousness and then you continuously reintroduce it until it becomes normalized.
Wearing a sweater indoors in the winter to save the world is not a new idea. I've never considered than normal either.
Re: (Score:2)
Oh yeah you will shower in piss (Score:2)
The clean water will go to the data centers and the processed water will be what us peasants are stuck with.
Initially that processed water will be heavily purified but over time budgets get cut and nobody wants to pay and who's going to pay anyway so before long you're going to start having all sorts of fun things in that water like some of the drugs that get pissed out or bacteria or whatever.
But within the next 10 to 15 years Americans are
Which is healthier, AI or airconditioning? (Score:2)
How come it's 70 degrees out and I'm the only one not using air conditioning because it has a stale smell and makes me feel bad?
Re: (Score:1)
He assumes everyone uses Freedom units (70F) and not Commie units (70C).
(Don't assume every American is an idiot based on the few vocal idiots here that think their opinions are divinely inspired.)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
darkness (Score:2)
Google only trains under the cover of darkness.
Re: (Score:2)
I like the meme, but it rules out using solar power for training.
Google would never lie (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
It's written in the contract. There's no we'll-get-round-to-it-at-some-stage. It happens when the grid operators want it to.
What we need to see now is not just Google but every AI company making these agreements with the grid operators.
Onsite generation (Score:2)
Sounds like Google will be looking into onsite generation if they're making such statements. Grid conditions are highly variable, and if you're in the AI biz, you aren't gonna want to shut down your LLMs for a heat wave.
Re: Onsite generation (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
That means poor utilization. It'd be better to keep everything online and running 24/7. Build out your own onsite power generation and you're in business.
Re: Onsite generation (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Grid conditions are highly variable, and if you're in the AI biz, you aren't gonna want to shut down your LLMs for a heat wave.
There's plenty of "AI"-related processing which could be delayed and nobody would notice. Training of new models, for example. You get [access to] a new model a couple days later and you won't even notice, because you get it when you get it already. Google is also sufficiently distributed that they can simply move this processing to another location, since both the queries and the results are very small and there will be no appreciable delay associated with doing the processing far away.
This should be the law (Score:4, Insightful)
We should use nonessential computing to help balance load by turning it on only when there is excess power.
Heat makes you stupid (Score:2)
So basically, heat makes you stupid. True on a whole-planet scale. Badaboom-tisssh.