GPT-OSS 120B Environmental Impact
OpenAI's first open-weight model — Apache 2.0, near o4-mini reasoning
- Architecture
- Dense Transformer (open-weight)
- Parameters
- 120B
- Context
- 128,000 tokens
- Provider
- OpenAI
Energy per query
1.8 Wh
6x more than a Google search (0.3 Wh)
CO2 per query
0.79 g
Global Average grid (475 gCO₂/kWh)
Water per query
7 mL
~154 queries to fill 1 litre
Processing location
Self-hosted (varies)
Provider
OpenAI
Category
Text / Chat
Grid carbon intensity
475 g CO2/kWh (27% renewable)
How does GPT-OSS 120B compare?
Detailed Breakdown
Energy Consumption
GPT-OSS 120B is OpenAI's first open-weight model (Apache 2.0), achieving near-parity with o4-mini on reasoning benchmarks. At ~1.8 Wh per query, it runs on a single 80GB GPU. Its release marked a major strategic shift for OpenAI toward open-source. Hugely popular on Hugging Face and Ollama.
Power Source & Carbon
Fully open-weight (Apache 2.0). Self-hostable on a single GPU, enabling deployment on low-carbon infrastructure.
Water Usage
At ~6.5 mL per query on cloud. Zero when self-hosted on consumer hardware.
About GPT-OSS 120B
GPT-OSS 120B is an open-source text and chat model from OpenAI, released in August 7, 2025, that runs below the category average for energy consumption at 1.8 Wh per query. Because its weights are publicly available, it can be self-hosted on any infrastructure — meaning its carbon footprint depends entirely on where and how you choose to run it. At 120B parameters, it openai's first open-weight model — apache 2.0, near o4-mini reasoning.
These figures are estimates derived from hardware specifications and API benchmarks — OpenAI has not published official energy data for GPT-OSS 120B. Actual consumption may vary significantly depending on batching, quantisation, and infrastructure optimisations that we cannot observe from outside.
GPT-OSS 120B in Context
Your yearly GPT-OSS 120B footprint
At 25 queries per day, your annual GPT-OSS 120B usage consumes 16.4 kWh — roughly what a fridge uses in a month. That produces 7.2 kg of CO₂.
Key Insights
OpenAI GPT Family
How energy efficiency has evolved across versions.
What does your GPT-OSS 120B usage cost the planet?
Use our calculator to estimate your personal environmental footprint based on how often you use GPT-OSS 120B.
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How much energy does GPT-OSS 120B use per query?
Each GPT-OSS 120B query consumes approximately 1.8 Wh of energy. This is 6x more than a traditional Google search (~0.3 Wh).
What is GPT-OSS 120B's carbon footprint?
Based on the carbon intensity of Self-hosted (varies), each query produces approximately 0.79 g of CO2. The grid in this region has a carbon intensity of 475 g CO2/kWh with 27% renewable energy.
How much water does GPT-OSS 120B use?
Each query consumes approximately 7 mL of water, primarily used for cooling the data centers that process the request.
How does GPT-OSS 120B compare to a Google search?
A GPT-OSS 120B query uses 6x more than a Google search in terms of energy. A Google search uses approximately 0.3 Wh, while GPT-OSS 120B uses 1.8 Wh.
Technical Details
Architecture
Dense Transformer (open-weight)
Parameters
120B
Context window
128,000 tokens
Release date
2025-08-07
Open source
Yes
Training data cutoff
2025-06