The Hidden Cost Behind Every “Thanks”
In our everyday lives, saying “please” and “thank you” is a basic courtesy — a sign of politeness we take for granted. But what if we told you that those tiny, kind words are costing us millions of dollars, gigawatt-hours of electricity, and even millions of liters of fresh water?
Welcome to the curious case of how polite language — when typed into AI systems like ChatGPT — has a measurable environmental footprint.
According to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, people’s habit of politeness with AI is surprisingly expensive and energy-intensive. While charming, these extra tokens (words) place a real-world burden on energy grids and water resources.
Let’s dive into how something as small as a “you’re welcome” can add up to a massive sustainability problem and what we can do about it.
How Polite Language Affects AI Systems
Every word you type into ChatGPT (or any AI language model) is processed by large-scale computational systems. These systems — hosted in data centers — consume enormous amounts of electricity to run powerful GPUs and even more resources to keep those systems cool.
Here’s the key: “Please,” “thank you,” and similar phrases may seem tiny in your prompt, but on a global scale, their impact is massive.
Sam Altman recently shared that OpenAI spends tens of millions of dollars every year processing these polite interactions. Each polite prompt adds a few tokens, which results in more computation, more electricity, and greater infrastructure strain.
Let’s quantify this.
Environmental Statistics: The Real-World Impact of Being Polite to AI
Global Usage Snapshot
- Estimated Monthly Active ChatGPT Users (2024–2025): 30 million+
- Approx. 70% of users regularly say “please” and “thank you” in prompts
- That’s 21 million users engaging in polite prompts
Prompt Frequency & Annual Polite Prompts
- Avg. interactions/user/day: 10
- Daily polite prompts: 21 million × 10 = 210 million
- Yearly polite prompts: 210 million × 365 = 76.65 billion
Electricity Consumption
- Avg. energy per ChatGPT prompt: ~0.03 kWh
- Extra energy for polite language (~5–10% more tokens): ~0.004 kWh
- Total extra energy/year: 76.65B × 0.004 kWh = 306.6 GWh
To put that into perspective:
- That’s enough to power 28,000 U.S. homes for an entire year
- Equal to running 50,000 refrigerators continuously
Water Usage for Cooling
- Avg. water needed for cooling per kWh: ~1 liter
- Total water consumption/year: 306.6 million liters
That’s the equivalent of:
- 122 Olympic-sized swimming pools
- 3+ million cups of coffee (in cooling cost alone)
CO₂ Emissions
- Global average CO₂ per kWh: ~0.4 kg
- Total CO₂ from polite prompts: 306.6M kWh × 0.4 kg = 122,640 metric tons
That’s equivalent to:
- Emissions from 27,000 gas-powered cars annually
Financial Impact
- Average cost per polite prompt: ~$0.0004
- Total cost annually: 76.65B × 0.0004 = $30.6 million
Why Does Politeness Cost So Much?
Each time you type “thanks,” the system must:
- Break your sentence into tokens (each word = ~1.3 tokens)
- Process these through multiple neural layers
- Store and return the output, which often includes another polite response like “you’re welcome”
So when you write: User: “Can you explain that again, please?”
AI: “Of course! Here’s a simpler version…”
User: “Thanks.”
AI: “You’re welcome!”
You’re actually initiating two extra prompts and multiple processing cycles all for manners. Multiply this by billions, and it becomes a major environmental event.
What Is Green Computing?
Green computing is an approach to reduce the ecological impact of digital technologies. It emphasizes:
- Energy-efficient hardware
- Renewable energy use in data centers
- Efficient algorithms and code optimization
- Water-saving cooling systems
According to IBM, green computing is essential for aligning IT development with environmental goals especially in power-hungry fields like artificial intelligence.
How Can AI Become More Sustainable?
- Smart Politeness Detection
Future models could detect polite intent without parsing every word, e.g., using sentiment analysis to infer manners instead of generating a full reply like “You’re welcome.”
- Templated Responses
A lower-energy method would be using predefined, token-light responses such as emojis, thumbs-up icons, or minimal phrases.
- Infrastructure Optimization
AI labs can offset polite costs by:
- Running servers on solar/wind/hydro power
- Using advanced cooling systems (e.g., submersion or geothermal cooling)
- Automating idle resource management
Should You Stop Saying Thank You to AI?
Not necessarily. It’s not about stopping kindness — it’s about being aware of the digital footprint.
We don’t need to stop being polite — we need to design systems that recognize politeness efficiently. In the meantime, it helps if users are mindful of their word count in interactions.
Instead of:
“Could you please explain this again in a bit more detail if possible? Thanks in advance.”
Try:
“Explain again with more detail.”
You’ll get the same output minus a bit of resource waste.
Final Thoughts: Mindfulness in the Age of AI
Digital behavior may feel intangible, but it has very real consequences for the planet. While kindness in human-AI interaction is charming, we’re learning that even virtual manners have a price.
The good news? With smarter design, energy-aware usage, and investments in green computing, we can make AI more sustainable — without sacrificing its humanity.
So go ahead and say “thank you,” just know: the planet hears it too.
