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Huang: AI Will Save the Climate, but First — 'Pain and Suffering'

Compiled by Sergey KostenchukPublished 2026-09-25Updated 2026-09-25

2026-09-25 Business NVIDIA

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💼 Huang: AI Will Save the Climate, but First — 'Pain and Suffering'

NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang, on The Ezra Klein Show (NYT transcript, September 23), called AI the 'best opportunity' for the climate, but warned: in the coming years, data centers will have to be powered by fossil fuels — there is simply 'not enough' sustainable energy. The Verge called this logic 'supervillain' rhetoric.

🌍 First-person industry rhetoric simplifies lobbying for gas and coal capacity for data centers and intensifies the conflict between climate goals and AI energy.

👤 The debate will affect everyone: electricity rates, protests around data centers; by 2028, up to 1,300 premature deaths are predicted due to air pollution from AI infrastructure (UC Riverside, Caltech).

Source 1: https://www.theverge.com/tech/1000140/jensen-huang-nvidia-ai-energy-climate-change-supervillain Source 2: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49841032

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NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang stated on The Ezra Klein Show (NYT transcript, September 23, 2026) that AI is the 'best opportunity' to address climate change, but that data centers will have to be powered by fossil fuels in the coming years, to which The Verge responded that renewable generation is cheaper than new gas and coal plants. Public defense of the 'dirty' phase of AI infrastructure growth from the industry's first-person perspective simplifies lobbying for new gas and coal capacity for data centers, intensifies the conflict between climate goals and AI energy needs, and provides opponents o