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An internal OpenAI memo outlining plans to deploy 250 gigawatts of computing power by 2033 has sparked concerns about the scale of the company's ambitions. Truthdig did the math on how much power such a goal would require, equating it to more electricity than the entire nation of India and more carbon dioxide emissions than ExxonMobil.
OpenAI's goals for scaling up "AI infrastructure" through new data center projects were already ambitious. Alongside Softbank and Oracle, it pledged a $500 billion investment over the next four years with Project Stargate in the US. OpenAI is also a key player in similar initiatives in the UK, Europe, and India. It's not alone, either, with Google, Amazon, Meta, and xAI all announcing enormous data center projects, often powered by environmentally questionable gas turbines.
In the memo, CEO Sam Altman says the “audacious long-term goal [for OpenAI] is to build 250 gigawatts of capacity by 2033.” To manage this, it would reportedly need to purchase upward of 30 million GPUs a year, and run them 24/7, 365 days a year—causing faster burnout and requiring more frequent replacements and upgrades.
The secondary effects are just as dire. To meet its compute goals, OpenAI would require 10 of the world's most advanced fabricator facilities operating nonstop just to provide the GPUs it will churn through, Truthdig estimates. That uses masses of energy and outputs a lot of carbon in its own right. It also squeezes the industry, driving up prices and reducing availability.
These data centers compete for local resources like energy and water supplies, too. That drives up prices and reduces access to clean supplies, which can have long-term economic and health implications for communities.
As Truthdig highlights in a chilling closing argument, OpenAI is just one of the many major AI companies pursuing these sorts of compute goals. Even if only a few of them get partway to meeting them, the ramifications for various industries and the environment could be devastating.
Disclosure: Ziff Davis, PCMag's parent company, filed a lawsuit against OpenAI in April 2025, alleging it infringed Ziff Davis copyrights in training and operating its AI systems.