GPT-5.4 Environmental Impact
OpenAI's current flagship — 77.2% SWE-Bench, record on OSWorld
- Architecture
- Multimodal Transformer with adaptive reasoning (Standard/Thinking/Pro)
- Context
- 512,000 tokens
- Provider
- OpenAI
Energy per query
5.5 Wh
18x more than a Google search (0.3 Wh)
CO2 per query
2.4 g
US East (Virginia) grid (450 gCO₂/kWh)
Water per query
20 mL
~50 queries to fill 1 litre
Processing location
Azure / Multi-cloud
Provider
OpenAI
Category
Text / Chat
Grid carbon intensity
450 g CO2/kWh (25% renewable)
How does GPT-5.4 compare?
Detailed Breakdown
Energy Consumption
GPT-5.4 is OpenAI's current flagship model, offered in Standard ($2.50/$15 per M tokens), Thinking, Pro ($30/$180), Mini, and Nano tiers. At ~5.5 Wh per Standard query, it achieves 83% on OpenAI GDPval and 77.2% SWE-Bench Verified. The Pro tier with extended reasoning can consume 20-30 Wh per query.
Power Source & Carbon
Runs across Azure, AWS, and GCP. OpenAI has continued to expand its infrastructure footprint to serve growing demand.
Water Usage
At ~20 mL per Standard query. The Pro tier can consume 3-4x this amount for complex reasoning tasks.
About GPT-5.4
GPT-5.4 is a text and chat model from OpenAI, released in March 5, 2026. OpenAI's current flagship — 77.2% SWE-Bench, record on OSWorld. Each query uses 5.5 Wh of energy and produces 2.4 g of CO₂. That's 18x the energy of a Google search — reflecting the computational demands of text and chat.
These figures are estimates derived from hardware specifications and API benchmarks — OpenAI has not published official energy data for GPT-5.4. Actual consumption may vary significantly depending on batching, quantisation, and infrastructure optimisations that we cannot observe from outside.
GPT-5.4 in Context
The efficiency alternative
Gemini Nano performs the same type of task using just 0.01 Wh per query — 100% less energy than GPT-5.4. For a user sending 25 queries per day, switching would save 50.1 kWh per year.
At global scale
With an estimated 10M+ daily users averaging 10 queries each, GPT-5.4 consumes roughly 550 MWh of electricity per day — enough to power 18333 homes.
Your yearly GPT-5.4 footprint
At 25 queries per day, your annual GPT-5.4 usage consumes 50.2 kWh — a meaningful fraction of household electricity. That produces 21.9 kg of CO₂.
OpenAI GPT Family
How energy efficiency has evolved across versions.
What does your GPT-5.4 usage cost the planet?
Use our calculator to estimate your personal environmental footprint based on how often you use GPT-5.4.
Calculate My ComputeFrequently Asked Questions
How much energy does GPT-5.4 use per query?
Each GPT-5.4 query consumes approximately 5.5 Wh of energy. This is 18x more than a traditional Google search (~0.3 Wh).
What is GPT-5.4's carbon footprint?
Based on the carbon intensity of Azure / Multi-cloud, each query produces approximately 2.4 g of CO2. The grid in this region has a carbon intensity of 450 g CO2/kWh with 25% renewable energy.
How much water does GPT-5.4 use?
Each query consumes approximately 20 mL of water, primarily used for cooling the data centers that process the request.
How does GPT-5.4 compare to a Google search?
A GPT-5.4 query uses 18x more than a Google search in terms of energy. A Google search uses approximately 0.3 Wh, while GPT-5.4 uses 5.5 Wh.
Technical Details
Architecture
Multimodal Transformer with adaptive reasoning (Standard/Thinking/Pro)
Context window
512,000 tokens
Release date
2026-03-05
Open source
No
Training data cutoff
2026-01