AI boom could leave an e-waste trail that wraps 6 times around Earth
Once power, networking, cooling, and other infrastructure are included, the total could be 40 to 60 times higher than the most widely cited academic projections.The report identifies five equipment categories comprising networking, power distribution, backup power systems, servers plus accelerators, and cooling. Together, these add up to about 7,000 metric tons for a reference 100 MW AI bit barn, much of which will have to be replaced when the facility is upgraded, it argues. The report says that would fill between 15 million and 23 million shipping containers.
- ▪Once power, networking, cooling, and other infrastructure are included, the total could be 40 to 60 times higher than the most widely cited academic projections.The report identifies five equipment categories comprising networking, power di
- ▪Together, these add up to about 7,000 metric tons for a reference 100 MW AI bit barn, much of which will have to be replaced when the facility is upgraded, it argues.
- ▪The report says that would fill between 15 million and 23 million shipping containers.
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| Original publisher | The Register |
| Canonical URL | https://www.theregister.com/off-prem/2026/09/19/ai-boom-could-leave-an-e-waste-trail-that-wraps-6-times-around-earth/5297451 |
| Publication time | Sat, 19 Sep 2026 15:30:00 +0200 |
| Retrieval time | 2026-09-19T13:33:45.854Z |
| Last seen | 2026-09-19T13:33:45.854Z |
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| Cluster | pForhdRvQ8xY · 1 stories |
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(function() { let windowUrl = window.location.href; windowUrl = windowUrl.substring(windowUrl.indexOf('?') + 1); let messageElement = document.querySelector('.shareableMessage'); if (windowUrl && windowUrl.includes('code') && windowUrl.includes('expires')) { messageElement.style.display = 'block'; } })(); off-prem AI boom could leave an e-waste trail that wraps 6 times around Earth Report says estimates focused on GPUs miss the mountains of power, cooling, and networking gear destined for scrap Dan Robinson Dan Robinson IT INFRASTRUCTURE REPORTER Published sat 19 Sep 2026 // 14:30 UTC READ MORE Anthropic decides to support OpenAI's markdown instructions spec 15 hours ago Virginia governor wakes up to fact datacenters have become political cancer 17 hours ago Compsci grads facing…
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