Could booming AI could raise your electric bill? Here's what has consumer watchdogs worried

"With the AI revolution fully underway, there's growing concern that the huge amount of energy it takes to power AI data centers could be passed on to consumers in the form of higher electric bills. Consumer Watchdog President Jamie Court spoke candidly Thursday about the growing costs of powering artificial intelligence. "This is happening all across the country and the little guy is getting the short end of the stick.""

"AI's enormous energy demand is driven in large part by the way it processes data. Tech expert Ahmed Banafa says AI algorithms run billions of calculations at the same time. "The difference between what we are using for AI and what we are using for our regular computer is that it's actually running everything at the same time," Banafa said."

"PG&E says it's true that electric bills are increasing for customers across the country but point to the fact that their average bills are expected to decrease this year and next. That's something that's been driven, at least in part, by the removal of temporary costs that had been present in bills over the past few years. "We've completed a number of projects to increase our wildfire safety and respond to emergencies," said PG&E spokesperson Paul Doherty."

AI data centers consume large amounts of electricity, creating risk that energy costs will be passed to consumers as higher electric bills. AI processing demands are high because algorithms perform billions of calculations simultaneously, increasing instantaneous power needs. Smaller residential customers may bear disproportionate impacts if costs are allocated to ratepayers. PG&E acknowledges national increases in electric bills but projects average bills to decline this year and next, partly due to removal of temporary costs implemented in recent years. PG&E notes completed wildfire safety and emergency-response projects and identifies underutilized California grid capacity as an opportunity to serve growing data center demand without necessarily raising rates.

Read at ABC7 San Francisco