Part I: Teaching AI Environmental Impact

In April 2025, Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, stated on social media that there is a real energy cost associated with using phrases like “please” and “thank you” (Haurari, 2025). Every single word in the prompt for AI requires processing energy. Kurtis Beavers from Microsoft’s Copilot design team stated that using polite terms prompted the system to respond in a polite manner (Hauari, 2025). In a study, Flathmann et al. (2024) found that some traditional polite responses helped the team to trust each other and the AI responses.

Part of the allure of artificial intelligence (AI) is the ability to just write out a question. This is called a “natural language” prompt, where you type out a question the same way you would speak it. However, computers do not function in that manner. For example, if you want to know the temperature in a particular place in the world, you may ask one of these questions:

• What is the temperature in Peru right now?
• What is the temperature in Peru? [Is the current time assumed?]
• temperature Peru

All three examples are valid. The last, which features only two words, is an effective search in a search engine. Most search engines automatically place the Boolean logic word “and” between the words, meaning that all words must be present in the search results. Computers need to parse every word (Waters, 2025). Each word adds to the computer processing needed to provide an answer (Waters, 2025). The more words that computers process, the more energy is needed (Waters, 2025).

There are some practical solutions to reduce energy consumption. Some of it is in the programming of AI, such as reducing the decimal places of the calculations (Midgley, 2025). This is a job for the AI companies to handle. Another solution that we can implement is to reduce the words we use in a search (Midgley, 2025). Does that mean we need to be impolite? Not necessarily. But we can “talk” to an AI system like it’s a computer and think about the keywords.

Now it is time to speak with your librarian (school, public, or academic) for help in understanding keywords. Learn how to use the Boolean logic words “and”, “or”, and “not.” We need to focus on the information we want, not the conversational style. AI is a powerful system and can help us, but we need to focus and think critically to both get the correct answer and reduce the environmental impact. The more we treat AI as the computer it is, the better our search terms will be.

References:

Flathmann, C., McNeese, N. J., Schelble, B., Knijnenburg, B., & Freeman, G. (2024). Understanding the impact and design of AI teammate etiquette. Human-Computer Interaction, 39(5/6), 444–471. https://doi-org.proxygsu-k12d.galileo.usg.edu/10.1080/07370024.2023.2189595

Hauari, G. (22 April 2025). Saying ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ to ChatGPT costs millions of dollars, CEO says. USA Today (online). https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2025/04/22/please-thank-you-chatgpt-openai-energy-costs/83207447007/

Midgley, M. (08 July 2025). Practical changes could reduce AI energy demand by up to 90%. University College London. https://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/2025/jul/practical-changes-could-reduce-ai-energy-demand-90

Waters, J. K. (05 May 2025). The High Price of Politeness: Why Saying ‘Please’ to ChatGPT Costs Millions. Environmental Protection (online). https://eponline.com/articles/2025/05/05/why-saying-please-to-chatgpt-costs-millions.aspx