Building and powering the infrastructure AI requires to operate has already consumed double the gigawatts and may soon tax copper resources exponentially.

The need for copper is steadily growing as worldwide urbanization spreads and global superpowers rush to electrify their transportation and energy industries. In addition to physical expansion, the world is also invisibly run on data centers that require vast amounts of copper for both their construction and operation.

Hospitals, law enforcement, financial institutions and social media platforms all utilize massive islands of data center computer banks to keep their data safe and flowing. Running through the physical accommodations of our information superhighway is copper, the material nervous system of all our electronics, wired and wireless alike.

Now, the rise of artificial intelligence is adding to the rising demand for this conductive red metal.

Aside from its role in front-page antics regarding celebrity deepfakes and legally dubious training models in the creative arts, AI has quietly been advancing almost every digital technology, from research and data analysis to automating and modernizing the safety and efficiency of mines. And its intensive data-crunching processes require a massive amount of energy.

Cisco, a world leader in networking equipment, software, and services, defines a data center as "a physical facility that organizations use to house their critical applications and data."

Today, copper is a fundamental component of all electrical systems and renewable-energy technology. EV batteries, power grids, solar panels, and wind turbines need the metal in considerable quantities. And while estimates are promising steady growth parallel to the adoption of these technologies, the surge in data center energy use, specifically from AI, has been exacerbating forecasts of a potential copper deficit.

Ones and zeros adding up

In a June, the Wall Street Journal reported that Bank of America estimates the demand for copper directly from data center construction could be around 200,000 metric tons a year between 2025 and 2028, while the infrastructure to generate and deliver electricity to those centers could drive an additional 500,000 tons of copper demand annually.

Switzerland-based commodity trader Trafigura forecasts that copper demand linked to data centers could add up to one million metric tons by 2030.

"If you look at the demand that is coming from data centers and related to that from AI, that growth has suddenly exploded," said Saad Rahim, chief economist at Trafigura. "That one million tonnes on top of what we have as four- to five-million-ton deficit gap by 2030 anyway," Rahim said. "That's not something that anyone has actually factored into a lot of these supply and demand balances."

Global statistics gathered by Brightlio provide some insights into the power demands of data centers and their impacts on climate and copper demand.

• Global data centers consumed 7.4 gigawatts of power in 2023, a 55% jump from 4.9 GW in 2022. Data center construction reached an all-time high in 2023, with 3.1 GW capacity being built – a 46% year-over-year increase.

• Data centers account for about 4% of global energy consumption and 1% of global greenhouse gas emissions.

• As of March, the U.S. tops the global charts at 5,388 data centers, which is 45% of the world's total, followed by Germany and the UK.

• Chat GPT's third iteration of generative text assistance is the most energy-intensive AI program of its kind in 2024, with over 1,200-megawatt hours consumed to train the model – far more energy-intensive than versions in 2023, which averaged under 400 MWh.

• The standard data center can fill a room or a building. As of this year's first quarter, worldwide hyperscale data centers currently under construction (super-sized for companies like Amazon, Google, Facebook, Microsoft, and IBM) totaled 921,458 square meters and just under 2,000 MW of power. Hyperscale data centers are much larger and can consume as much power as an entire town.

• Data from the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) shows in 2023, Americans consumed an estimated 1.8–1.9 million metric tons of copper. This averages 12 pounds of copper per person.

• According to a 2024 electricity report by the International Energy Agency (IEA), a typical Google search requires 0.3 watt-hours, while a ChatGPT request consumes 2.9 watt-hours on average.

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A typical Google search requires an estimated 0.3 watt-hours and an AI-driven ChatGPT request consumes 2.9 watt-hours – meaning this article costs the grid an roughly 25 watt-hours of electricity for the Google searches, AI summaries, Grammarly suggestions, and other data driven research.

Shopping around for copper

In a supplemental mid-May report, the IEA emphasized the necessity for long-term investment in critical metals projects – including copper, which was added to the U.S. Department of Energy's list of critical materials last year – along with roughly $800 billion in mining investment by 2040 to source the metals and materials needed to support the green transition.

Innovation, new mines, and improved recycling to reduce e-waste are recommended to ease supply strains; as the price of copper climbs, both the incentive to recycle and the development of new mines will increase, helping to bolster supply.

Shrewd mining corporations have been in search of copper properties. In 2023, BHP bought Oz Minerals for $6.4 billion and bid nearly $50 billion in pursuit of Anglo American's copper assets, but the two were unable to settle, with Anglo American hanging on to its copper assets.

Like BHP, Rio Tinto has been investing in copper mines in Utah and Arizona and acquired Canada's Turquoise Hill Resources in 2022, which included the Oyu Tolgoi site in Mongolia, one of the world's largest copper deposits.

"We are aligning our growth with the materials needed for the energy transition. We are growing in copper," Rio Tinto Chief Executive Jakob Stausholm said at an investor conference last month. "Volumes at Oyu Tolgoi in Mongolia are steadily rising, which will help us deliver 1 million tonnes a year across our copper portfolio by the end of the decade."

Rio Tinto has also been developing strategic partnerships with Chile-owned miner Codelco, the world's largest copper producer, seeking new commercially viable deposits, and First Quantum Minerals to develop the La Granja project in Peru, which ranks as the world's fifth-largest copper project, and testing its Nuton bioleaching technology to recover copper from tailings with partner Arizona Sonoran Copper.

"Think of increasing demand for things like electric vehicles, the copper plumbing in our houses ... transmission lines, smartphones, electronic devices-the things you can't live without all include copper," said Rio Tinto Copper Chief Operating Officer Clayton Walker in an interview with National Association of Manufacturers.

The U.S. is estimated to consume nearly 2 million metric tons of copper per year but only produces slightly over 1 million metric tons. However, "by 2035, that demand is estimated to be around 4 to 5 million tons of copper a year," said Walker. "The question is, where are we going to get all that additional copper?"